Family Secret
by Sapphire1
Summary: 17 years ago the Cullens took in a human baby. Now Edward is a normal teenager with a not so normal family. Without any special powers, will the girl he loves still be interested in him? And will he be able to hide his family's secret? AU - human Edward
1. Chapter 1

FAMILY SECRET

SERIES: Foundling

AUTHOR: Sapphire

RATING: PG13

DISCLAIMER: Is my name Stephenie Meyer? No, I don't think so. That means all is hers and mine is nothing.

WARNING: English is not my first language. I do my best, but there still might be some issues. Sorry about this.

THANKS: to my beta

SUMMARY: 17 years ago the Cullens took a human baby in as one of their own. Now Edward is a normal teenager with a not so normal family. Without any special powers, will the girl he loves still be interested in him? And will he be able to hide his family's secret from her and from the world?

This is a follow up of my story 'Foundling', though you don't need to read this one to understand this story.

* * *

*Slap*

"I hate you, Edward Cullen!"

With this parting shot, Lauren turned on her heels and stalked across the Forks High School cafeteria. During our argument all talk in the room had ceased, and now every single student in the room was either staring at me or at the retreating back of my girlfriend - well, I guess, now ex-girlfriend.

Touching the side of my face where her hand had connected when she had slapped me, I felt a light sting, but nothing too serious. I doubted there would be a bruise to show for it. Besides that, I didn't really feel anything other than a vague sense of relief.

Hooking up with Lauren had been a mistake to begin with, and I'm still not quite sure why I ever had allowed it to go so far for us to be considered an item. She was pretty enough, that was true, but other than that there was nothing I particularly liked about her. I couldn't talk to her about the things I enjoyed to do, it had always had been about her. What she wanted, what she liked, what she thought about others. Her. Her. Her.

I was pretty sure I was nothing but another notch in her bed post. A sign that she could get any boy she wanted. I had been looking for a way out for weeks now, and I was only too happy that it was finally over.

I shrugged and turned to the table the rest of my family had claimed as their own, while the noise level in the room went up again.

As I walked towards the table, my mom looked at me with concern in her eyes, but I simply shook my head slightly to tell her that I was fine and she dropped her gaze back down to the tray in front of her.

When looking at Rosalie, nobody would believe that she had raised me since I was a baby. For one, currently she didn't look much older than I did, eighteen to my seventeen years. Of course, most people didn't know that she was a vampire and thus didn't age at all. She would look the same as today in ten, twenty, a hundred years.

In fact, all of my family, with the single exception of myself, were vampires.

My dad Emmett - or rather the man who had raised me as his son and now posed as my older brother - sat next to my mother, an arm placed protectively around her shoulder. When I sat down, he pushed his tray towards my place, the food on it, naturally, untouched. Suddenly hungry, I dug in, knowing he certainly wouldn't eat it.

"Are you okay?" he asked in a low whisper.

I nodded, my mouth too full answer, but I hoped he would get the message. I didn't really want to talk about the whole affaire. To be honest, I was just glad it was over.

I had barely finished, when more food appeared on my tray as if by magic, and the empty wrapper from the sandwich I had just eaten ended up on the tray in front of Jasper.

My uncle winked, and I returned his smile. He knew probably best how relieved I felt. As an empath, he had most likely sensed how tense I had been the last couple of weeks and was as glad as I was that it was over.

The last member of my family present, my aunt Alice, looked across the room, watching and listening to the little groups clustered around the tables.

"And, what are they saying?" I asked and bit into an apple, which seconds before had been on Rosalie's tray. I was sure that that little scene Lauren and I had just played out would be the center of more than one chat, probably replacing the talk about the arrival of a new student to the school, which had busied most of them before the big show part had started.

Her eyes turned distant for a second and I wondered if she might have a vision.

"Looks like you're back on the market," she said then, a grin playing around her lips. "Quite a few ladies seem to be perfectly willing to help you get over the terrible loss you've just suffered."

I groaned, hiding my face in my hands.

Now I remembered again why I hadn't broken off with Lauren earlier. For some unfathomable reason half of the girls at Forks High thought I was a good 'catch'. I didn't quite get it. I thought of myself more or less ordinary, but obviously the female half of the school thought differently. Maybe it was the money. We weren't exactly poor and we did little to hide that we had money. Of course we never showed _how_ much we really had. If they knew my family had accumulated billions of dollars over the last hundred years or so, I had no idea what would happen.

The bell rang for the next lesson and I got up.

Biology was possibly my favorite subject at school. Even though I've already worked through the material for this year I couldn't help but being fascinated by it. It was life that did intrigue me. What was it that made the collection of some organic and anorganic chemicals to come together and become alive? What made us tick? It was amazing and I wish I would be able to understand it all.

The class room was already open, but I was the first one inside. I made the way to my usual place and sat down. Pulling out my books, I started to read the text for today's lesson.

The room filled slowly, the other students trickling in to take their places. As usual, the seat next to me remained empty, which was exactly the way I liked it.

Mr. Banner, the teacher, finally showed up, closely followed by the new girl. They talked for a moment, then Banner pointed her to the empty seat next to mine. So much for staying on my own.

I pulled my books to my side of the desk making room for her stuff.

Until my little display in the cafeteria the new girl had been the hot topic of the day. Lauren had given me the complete rundown earlier, though, to be honest, I hadn't listen too closely. From what I remembered, the girl used to live in Phoenix, but now had moved in with her father who was the Chief of Police here. Why, I had no idea. It didn't matter to me.

Now that she walked towards me, I got a first good look and was pleasantly surprised. Dark brown eyes, the exact shade of good chocolate, dominated a pale, heart shaped face. Her hair was also brown, hanging straight down to the middle of her back. She was slim, but still had curves in all the right places.

She smiled shyly as she took the place next to mine.

"Hi," I greeted her. "I'm Edward Cullen." I held out my hand to her.

"I've heard," she said and a pink flush crept up her face. But she took my hand and returned the shake. "I'm Bella Swan."

Her hand felt cold and for some reason I was reluctant to let it go, but, of course, eventually I had to. She looked down at the desk, her bag, the floor, every place but me, her long hair falling across her face, hiding it from my sight.

So I guess she had heard Lauren's and my little display. I wondered what she was thinking of that.

And then I wondered why I wondered what she was thinking.

Banner called the class to attention, but today he couldn't capture my interest as usually. While I tried to follow the lecture, I noticed that I snug a glance at the girl next to me every now and again. Had she been tense at the beginning of the lesson, she soon relaxed and eventually, she took her hair and placed it behind one ear. I couldn't help and watch her profile as she faced forward, listening to Banner talking about this or that, I had no idea what.

I didn't know what it was about her.

It wasn't that she was particular beautiful. Beauty I knew. I was surrounded by it every day, as every single member of my family was exceptionally beautiful. It was part and parcel of being a vampire, a part of them that made it easier for them to lure an unsuspecting human into their clutches. Not that my family used it. None of them drank human blood.

Maybe, if Bella had been more beautiful, I would have been less interested. She was pretty, though, and somehow that was much better.

The hour ended before I had worked out what it was that fascinated me about her, and I would be lying if this didn't frustrate me.

She stuffed her books back into her bag, only for it to fall open again when she picked it up to sling it over her shoulder. All the items inside tumbled out and spread over the class room floor. I heard some of the leaving students laugh and I glowered at them angrily before I bent down to help Bella to pick up her things.

"I'm so sorry," she mumbled, placing the bag on the ground to make it easier to put her things back in.

"It can happen to anyone," I replied, handing her a pen that I retrieved from under the next desk.

"No, this is always only happening to me," she retorted angrily. Once again she blushed and her eyes were cast down. "Sorry."

For a moment an uncomfortable silence stretched between us. The class room was pretty much empty by now and I really needed to get going to get to my last class of the day.

"You've got everything?" I asked, casting around if I could see another wayward item that might belong to her.

"I think that's it. Thank you." She looked up with a smile on her lips. But suddenly she seemed to realize it was me who had helped her and her smile fell.

"Thanks," she said once again, but much colder.

"What's your next class? I could take you," I offered suddenly.

I don't know who was more surprised, she or I.

"I think I can find my way on my own, thanks," she retorted, sounding a little angry.

I didn't know what had caused her mood swing. A second ago she seemed to be really glad I had been helping her, and now she looked seriously pissed.

I took a step back, allowing her to get past me and to the door. She stopped there for a moment, looking back at me, and then she was gone.

Leaving me behind, feeling seriously confused.

* * *

I was quiet on our way home, driving my car absentmindedly. As usual, Rosalie and Emmett went with me, while Alice and Jasper took the Jeep. I knew my aunt and uncle wouldn't be coming home tonight, as they planned to go hunting, so I wasn't surprised when they drove straight on once I turned into the driveway that led to our house.

At home I lost no time and went to my room. I wanted to be alone, wanted time to work out what had happened today in Biology. What it was about Bella Swan that wouldn't allow me to forget her face and her voice.

She was just another girl. Pretty enough, yes, but other than that just a normal girl.

I knew nothing about her.

Well, that was easily rectified. I opened my laptop and started up the internet browser.

But before I could start my search, I heard a knock at my door.

"Yes?" I asked, not too friendly.

The door opened and my mom looked inside.

"Are you okay?" she asked gently, coming further in.

"I'm fine, mom," I said with a low sigh.

"And why you're hiding in your room then?" She took a seat on the couch, watching me as I started to type letters and numbers into the computer.

"I'm not hiding," I protested, slightly angry.

"Is it because of your break up with Lauren?" she asked, concerned.

I knew Rosalie had never really liked my ex-girlfriend, but she hadn't stopped me from making my own mistakes. All she had asked was not to bring her to the house. Which was, after all, only prudent, with Lauren being human and everybody else in my family, well, not. Though I knew she never would have been in any danger with my family - their control was much too good for that - there was still the risk that she would notice something not quite right with my them and that was something we did try to avoid as much as possible. Though, to be honest, I doubted that Lauren would have realized what was going on, even if a member of my family would have made a kill right in front of her and sucked the blood dry from an animal.

I finally turned my chair around and looked at her.

"No, it's not because of Lauren. I'm actually glad it's over. I don't know what I ever saw in her."

"She's pretty," she said with a shrug.

Strangely enough, this comment conjured Lauren's face up as well as Bella's and placed them next to each other in my mind's eye. While Lauren's face looked ... nice, Bella's face seemed far more captivating to me, more alive. More beautiful.

With a dismissive wave of my hand, I wiped the images away, though Bella's faced seemed to linger a little bit longer, refusing to disappear.

"Not that pretty," I replied with a shrug.

My mom chuckled at that. "Could it be that being around us has spoiled you for mere humans?"

I had to laugh at that. It was true that having six exceptionally beautiful people to compare other people to, usually resulted in said other people to fall short in the looks department. But that also led to me looking at other things than outward appearances in people.

And, well, Lauren had been lacking in those as well.

"It had been a mistake to hook up with Lauren and I'm just glad it's over," I repeated my words from earlier. "Really, mom, I'm fine. I just need to do some research on the computer. For school."

Technically, this was true. Bella was at school, so my research into her was for school, right?

My mom looked at me a little bit longer, then finally nodded.

"Okay, I'll leave you alone then. Dinner will be ready for you at six."

"Thanks, mom. Love ya."

"Love ya, too."

Then she was gone.

Half an hour later I had some more information about Bella. My uncle Jasper was a world class hacker and I had picked up a few tricks from him over time, enough to now get me undetected into every database that had information on one Isabella Marie Swan. I now knew when and where she had been born, who her parents were. I knew now that her mom had recently remarried a minor league baseball player. I knew where she had lived for the last seventeen years, where she went to school and that she had had way too many visits to various emergency rooms for somebody as young as her. I knew her grades were reasonably good, that she obviously favored English Lit, Biology and Spanish over PE and math. I knew that she had exactly 536,50 dollars on her saving account.

But I still really didn't know anything about her as a person.

I was sorely tempted to take a stab at her e-mail account, but finally refrained from doing so, realizing that this would be a little bit on the extreme side of things. So I browsed the internet for other, more personal aspects, of her life only to come up empty. She had no blog, no Life Journal, no MySpace page. There were no pictures of her I could find. She had never bought or sold anything on ebay or any other internet auction. It was as if she had gone to extremes to hide herself, who she was, from the rest of world.

What was going on in her head? What was she interested in? Did she still have a boyfriend back in Phoenix?

Who was she?

And why, why was I so obsessed in finding out all those things?


	2. Chapter 2

The next morning at school didn't go by fast enough. I caught glimpses of Bella in the hallways and later at lunch, but never had a chance to talk to her. Eventually, finally, Biology came round and I waited for her to show up, waited for her to sit down next to me.

She came in together with Mike Newton. Mike must have told her something funny, for she was laughing. I felt the urge to strangle him.

The moment she sat eyes on me, her smile fell and a crimson flush colored her face.

Damn.

"Hi, Bella," I said as if I hadn't noticed her reaction.

"Hi, Edward," she replied coldly, took her seat and then looked away.

For the rest of the hour she ignored me. The seat I was occupying might as well have been empty. Banner was showing slides, so no interaction was actually required, but still it annoyed me.

Why was she ignoring me? What had I done to displease her?

Why did I care?

The hour seemed to fly by, but at the same time seemed to crawl excruciatingly slow.

Finally, far too soon, the bell rang, and before I knew it, she had gathered her things – today without any mishap – and practically ran out of the room, leaving me once again behind, feeling mystified.

The next two days were basically a repeat of the day before. I only saw her from afar, and in Biology she pretty much ignored me.

On Friday, I decided that I should stop obsessing over her. It was more than obvious that she wasn't the least bit interested in me, and with any other girl that would have been perfectly fine by me.

I joined my family at lunch, forcing myself to sit with the back to the room, so I wasn't tempted to start looking for her. I played around with my salad, being not particularly hungry, when Emmett looked over my shoulder and said: "The new girl's watching you."

I whipped around so fast I toppled my chair over and landed ungracefully on the floor, spilling my food all around me.

Jasper and Emmett broke out in laughter, drowning out, what I knew was laughter from the other students in the room. Still sitting on the floor I caught a glimpse of Bella, but her face was turned away and I couldn't read what she was thinking of my mishap.

Angrily I pushed myself off the ground, rightening my chair and sat back down.

"Are you all right, Edward?" my mom asked, punching Emmett in the arm, so he finally quieted down. In anybody but a vampire this punch would have been cause for a trip to the ER, but Emmett probably didn't even feel it.

"I'm okay," I said, still angry. Nothing had been hurt by my stupid spill, nothing but my pride.

"What is it with you and that girl anyway?" Emmett asked, a wide grin still plastered over his face.

"It's nothing," I retorted, hoping he would drop it. But of course, him being who he was, he didn't.

"Ever since she came here, you've been mooning over her."

"I haven't been 'mooning' over her," I said annoyed.

"You have," he repeated. "Don't think we haven't noticed."

I groaned. I felt a headache coming. I massaged the bridge of my nose.

"Can't you just drop it," I begged, looking at him imploringly.

He opened his mouth, clearly not willing to do as I asked, but Alice intervened.

"Leave it alone, Emmett. This only concerns Edward."

They exchanged glances, and finally Emmett nodded.

"Thanks, Al," I said gratefully. I wasn't quite sure why Alice had taken my side – she usually was the biggest gossip in our family – but I was just too glad to end this topic for now to dig deeper into her reasons.

Biology was another round of torture. Not only did I have to endure the bickering of my fellow students on my way there, but Bella had this annoying smirk on her face. It was almost as if she knew she had been the reason I had made a fool of myself in the cafeteria.

"Are you okay?" she asked, sounding only vaguely interested.

"Thanks, I'm fine," I pressed out, taking my seat.

"That was quite a spill you took there," she grinned.

Wow, more than three words in a row. She was suddenly talking to me. And she was smiling at me, even if it was to make fun of me.

"I'm fine!" I repeated, more forcefully. My pride was still too much hurt to make light of the incident.

"Suit yourself," she muttered to herself, her grin falling, and turned her attention to Banner who had just entered the class room.

I wanted to bang my head against the hard surface of the table. Here she was suddenly willing to talk to me for a change and I had to shoot her down.

God, why did she do that to me?

Once again she ignored me for the rest of the lesson. I tried to do the same, though I failed in that task spectacularly. I have no idea what Banner was lecturing on and when he asked me a question I had to ask him to repeat it to me, before I could answer, which was a first for me.

* * *

It was raining on the weekend, which wasn't exactly a surprise in Forks. The fact that the small town west of the Olympic National Park was one of the places with the least amount of sunshine in continental US had played a big factor in the decision of my family to move here.

I volunteered on every other Saturday at the hospital in Forks where Carlisle worked, so that's were I was. As the son of one of the resident physicians (that was for convenience sake – officially I and the others were all adopted children of Carlisle), I had a little bit more leeway than most other volunteers. I was allowed to follow Carlisle around for the morning as he made his rounds, assisting him with whatever he was doing. I hoped to be a doctor one day, and I enjoyed working with him in those hours.

At lunch time, I helped with handing out the meals and then I went over to the wing with the long-term patients. Even though Forks Community Hospital was a rather small hospital, it still had a 20-bed long-term care facility that tended, among others, for several cancer patients.

Mrs. Jackson, a 74 year old former National Park guide was my favorite, and I was looking forward to meeting with her again. She was in the later stages of colorectal cancer, and wasn't expected to live to see 75. This didn't mean however that she was depressed or in any way down trodden. Her husband of 47 years had died two years ago, and it was almost as if she was looking forward to seeing him again. When I opened the door to her room, she greeted me with a big smile and waved me over to her bed.

"Hello, Mrs. Jackson," I said.

"Edward, my boy, come in, come in."

I moved over to her bed, mindful of the tubes and lines sneaking in from the drip at her side and the machines, to some place underneath her sheets. I pulled up a chair and sat down.

"So, have you met any nice girls lately?" she asked the same question she asked every time she saw me.

Normally, my reply would have been 'no, at least nobody as nice as you are', but today those words wouldn't come over my lips. My thoughts immediately went to Bella.

Damn!

She immediately picked up on my failed response, and her smile widened even further.

"Edward, do tell me, have you met a girl?"

I swallowed, and looked away for a moment. "Well, I do meet girls every day, really. They're all over school."

"But this week you met somebody special, didn't you?" she prodded.

Finally I nodded.

She clapped her hands like a little girl.

"Oh, tell me about her. Who is she? What is she like? Why haven't you mentioned her before?"

Taking a deep sigh, I proceeded to tell her about Bella, how she just had moved to Forks and that she was in Biology with me.

"I don't think she likes me, though," I concluded. "She ignores me whenever she's near and we've barely exchanged more than two words last week."

Mrs. Jackson placed her finger at the side of her face, looking at me with a tilted head.

"But you do like her?" she asked.

I sighed. "I don't know. She really hasn't given me a chance yet to find out. It's just … I can't stop thinking about her. When I'm in class with her, all I can do is watch her. And when I'm not with her, I can't stop myself from looking for her. I really don't know what's the matter with me."

She tutted at that outburst.

"Edward, I think you've got it bad," she said with a speculating look on her face.

"What does it help, when she doesn't like me?"

God, when did I start to sound so whiny?

Mrs. Jackson reached for the controls and pushed the button to lift the head part of the bed up, so she ended up sitting almost upright. Her hand reached out to mine and she took it. She started to stroke her thumb over the back of my hand. Surprisingly this calmed me down, and after a minute of this I smiled again.

"Okay," she said, "let's see if we can work out why she thinks she doesn't like you, Edward."

I wanted to protest on the 'think' part, for there was no doubt in my mind that Bella didn't just think she didn't like me, she simply did, but Mrs. Jackson held up her hand, and I fell silent before I said something.

"Tell me exactly how you met. Don't leave anything out. Tell me what she said and how she said it," she commanded and I obeyed.

She listened, prodding me to go on when I faltered in my narrative. At the end, she nodded thoughtfully.

"So, was it in Biology she saw you the first time?"

I was about to say yes, but then realized that this couldn't be the case. She had known my name, had said she had heard it before. And the only time this could have been the case was when Lauren broke up with me.

"I believe she must have seen me in the cafeteria earlier, when Lauren slapped me and told me she hated my guts," I said quietly.

"Aha," Mrs. Jackson said satisfied, "I think we now hit the point of the matter."

"We have?" I asked, confused.

"Try to put yourself in her shoes, Edward. She's new to the school, knowing nobody, maybe she's shy. Then she sees you breaking up spectacularly in the middle of the cafeteria with a good-looking girl. I'm sure there were others around her and they were talking about you, and she listened. There may have been some not too nice comments about you. And then, the next thing she knows is that she's thrown together with you in Biology. And you are nice to her."

I listened, but so far it eluded me where Mrs. Jackson was going. I frowned.

"Should I've been rude to her, then?" I asked, confused.

"Of course not, silly. But think about it. She sees you've just had a break up, and suddenly you're interested in her. She's new, she knows she just can't come into a new town, hook up with the most eligible bachelor in the school, who happens to be drop dead gorgeous. How long does she think this might last? You seem to be a player, and she's just a rebound, nothing any girl wants to be. And once it's over, she'll have lost any chance on making any new friends. She'll be branded until the end of school. So she tries to push you away."

Strangely enough, what she said made sense. Sort of.

"I'm not 'drop dead gorgeous'," I said in protest.

She actually rolled her eyes. "Edward, my boy, I might be old, but I'm neither blind nor stupid. If I'd been 50 years younger, I would chase you to the end of the earth. You have the looks and you have this smile that will make weaker women faint. It is actually a little bit dazzling."

I couldn't help but smile at that statement, and she actually blushed, before looking away.

"You see," she said and it only made me smile wider.

I thought for a moment. "So, what you're saying is that Bella believes I'm just interested in her because she thinks I'm a player – which I'm not – and she's afraid what will happen once we break up, which she believes will be inevitable."

"Got it in one," she praised, taking my hand again, patting it.

"So, how can I convince her that this is not true? That I just would like to learn more about her and that I'm really interested in her as a person?" I asked.

Now it was Mrs. Jackson's turn to sigh. "This I'm not so sure about. I believe this is going to take time. Don't be too pushy, give her time to adjust here. Be yourself."

Be myself. Well, I could try to do that.

"Thank you," I said from the bottom of my heart.

For the rest of the afternoon I entertained Mrs. Jackson until she got tired and dismissed me so she could take a nap. I had to promise her to keep her updated on my progress with Bella and I didn't have it in my heart to deny her that.


	3. Chapter 3

Monday morning came and I was in a much better mood. I had thought about what Mrs. Jackson had said, and sensed she might have had at least some things right.

I've moved enough times in my life from one place to another to know how hard it could be to make new friends. Last time, when we moved to Forks, I hadn't made many efforts for I had my family and really didn't need any more friends. But before, when I had been younger, I had wanted friends my age, and being new in a school had always made it difficult.

Bella was just careful. She needed to figure out where everybody stood, who were the kids to hang out with, and who weren't. We, the Cullens, were certainly not on the list, though that was something we actively enforced. We couldn't risk that anybody found out our secrets and if that meant we were considered elite snobs that didn't matter to us. It was just as much for their safety as for ours.

Bella didn't – couldn't – know that. It would be better for her if she made friends with the 'normal' kids first.

Not that I didn't want to be friends with her. I still did want to be her friend, to know her better. But I was willing to give her time to settle in first.

It had snowed over night and Emmett and Jasper had involved me in a snow ball fight on our way to lunch. As usual I had been at a severe disadvantage. I just didn't have the strength or the speed of the rest of my family even when toned down to appear human, but eventually Jasper had joined my side, and we had managed to get to Emmett. I was, of course, dripping wet when we got to the cafeteria, but I didn't mind. It had been fun.

In Biology, Mr. Banner had distributed one microscope and a box with slides per table. Working with our lab partners, we were supposed to sort the slides of onion root tips into the phases of mitosis they represented without using our books.

I had done this before, so I thought I would give Bella a chance to show what she knew.

"You want to start?" I asked her, pushing the microscope closer to her place.

She nodded without a word and put the first slide into the microscope. She peered through the eyepiece.

"Prophase," she said. "Wanna check?"

I nodded and she pushed the equipment towards me. As I reached toward to take the microscope from her, our hands touched for the fraction of a second and something like an electric jolt passed between us. We both looked up at the same moment and our eyes met.

Time froze.

I don't know what it was, but suddenly I couldn't breathe. My heart stopped and lost myself in the depth of her chocolate brown yes.

I don't know how long it took, may it be a second, a minute or a year, but eventually I had to breathe again, and the spell we've been under was broken.

I swallowed, though my throat was suddenly bone try.

"I'm sorry," I said, pulling back my hand.

"It's okay," she replied, sounding a little bit breathless herself.

I forced myself to look through the eyepiece and confirmed Bella's identification of the slide. I wrote it down into our lab sheet and swapped the slide out for the next one.

The rest of the lab went by quietly. Bella identified all slides correctly and we were the first team that finished.

Waiting for the rest of the class to catch up, I decided to risk talking to her again.

"So, how do you like Forks so far?" I thought this would be a safe enough topic.

She pursed her lips and I found myself distracted on how cute this looked.

"It's … very wet," she said, obviously trying to be diplomatic.

"Isn't that true," I chuckled. "Where did you live before you came here?" I knew already, of course, but I couldn't tell her that.

"Phoenix. It didn't rain there nearly as much. It was much browner there."

"I happen to like brown," I said, thinking of the color of Bella's eyes and her hair.

She blushed – I've noticed before that it didn't take a lot to make her blush – and then looked away.

"I could get used to green," she said quietly, almost too low for me to hear.

I wasn't sure what she was meant with that, only that it was more than just a statement about the greenness of the forests around Forks.

Banner then came around to check our results. He wasn't surprised I had known all the answers to the questions, but insinuated that I had helped Bella. I couldn't allow that misconception to remain standing.

"Bella identified three of the five slides," I defended her. Banner looked skeptical at her.

"I did the lab before in my old school, but we used whitefish blastula," she informed him with a half shrug.

"So, you like bio then?" I asked after Banner had moved away to check on the others.

"It's pretty cool, though I do like English lit more," she said.

"What are you reading right now?" I asked.

"_Of Mice and Man_. Not my favorite, but better than some others I've had."

"Yeah, I know what you mean. All those dreams, all those hopes and in the end it was all for nothing. It's downright depressing."

She laughed and I wanted for time to stop, so I would always hear that sound.

Slowly, slowly, I reminded myself. Keep it simple, don't rush her.

For the next five minutes we continued with light conversation, keeping to safe topics like school, weather, the latest movie, until Banner called the class to order and explained to the others what we should have been seeing.

I felt pretty damn good when school finally ended. I actually had had a real conversation with Bella and she had been friendly enough. And there might have been more, something more than just friendliness.

I was looking forward to the next day's Biology.

Little did I know what the next day would bring.

* * *

Yesterday's rain had frozen on the streets and a thin dusting of snow covered the treacherous ice. Rosalie insisted she drive, even though normally I was the designated driver. As her reflexes were far superior to mine, I accepted. I believed myself to be a fairly good driver, having gone through some rigorous training at the hands of my car-nuts family, but there were situations where I knew my mother just felt saver. Not for her, naturally, but for me. It was stupid, but I couldn't deny her.

We arrived at the school parking lot without any problems and parked in our usual spot. It was too early to go in, so we just hung around, watching the other cars pull in. Emmett and Rosalie started to make out, so I moved a little bit away from them. They were my parents for crying out loud and there were some things I really didn't need to see.

When Bella drove into the lot in her faded red Chevy truck, I had to grin. She was driving so carefully. She parked a few cars away from us. When she got out, she slowly pulled herself along the side of her car, her feet slipping on the ice, until she reached the back tire. She was checking for something, though I didn't know what. After she straightened up, she remained standing there for a moment, a small smile on her face.

The next second a couple of things happened at the same time.

I felt Alice tense next to me, gasping the word 'No!'

My eyes immediately searched for Bella, and before I knew why, I was moving, racing towards her.

At this moment, a dark blue van entered the parking lot at a speed that far exceeded anything prudent for this kind of weather. The van hit a batch of ice at an unlucky angle and began to spin across the parking lot, aiming with unwavering certainty towards the girl standing next to the faded red Chevy.

Towards Bella.

I pumped my legs harder, pushing myself to my top speed. Luckily I didn't hit any icy spots, for this would have brought me down for sure. I reduced the distance between myself and the girl frozen to the spot, as the van spun with screeching tires closer and closer, and I knew with absolute certainty that I would be too late, that there was no way I would be able to make it in time to save her.

In one final mad dash I leapt at her and tackled her to the ground, pushing her as far away as possible from the place she had been only a fraction of a second before. As I barreled into her, my shoulder collided with something hard and cold and I felt fire explode from that point. We landed on the ground, only inches away from a blue wall that, unbelievably, was still coming nearer. At the very last moment, I turned around, pushing Bella as close to the ground as possible, hoping she would be low enough to end up underneath the car, not against it.

The back of my head collided with something hard and unyielding.

There was a flash of pain and then there was only darkness.


	4. Chapter 4

"Edward, honey, wake up. Please."

I knew that waking up would be a bad idea, but my mother's voice was too compelling to be ignored. I had the vague feeling she had been calling my name for a while now, for there was a desperate tone to her voice I didn't recall ever hearing before and I simply couldn't refuse her any more.

"Mmh," I mumbled, fighting my way up through the darkness.

"That's it, Edward. You're safe. Wake up for me."

Cold fingers stroke along the side of my face and instinctively I leaned closer.

"Come on," she goaded me on and with an effort far out of proportion to what it normally entitled I finally opened my eyes.

I had known it would be a mistake. A stabbing pain cut into my brain, setting it on fire. Immediately I shut my eyes again, but the damage was done. Bile rose in my throat, and before I knew it I was leaning over the railing of the bed I was in, puking out everything I had eaten that morning for breakfast. Luckily Rosalie held something underneath my face, so I didn't splatter everything over the linoleum floor and her. It was awkward as I couldn't move one of my arms, but with my mother's support I managed to get most of the mess where it did the least damage.

I groaned when I fell back into the pillows, my right shoulder now adding to the growing list of aches. I swore to myself that I would never ever open my eyes again. Or eat anything for that matter.

"Edward, drink this."

Something cold touched my bottom lip and my mother placed her hand around the back of my head, as she helped me to take a sip of the blessedly cold, clean water. I rinsed my mouth and once again my mother placed some basin underneath me face so I could get rid of the terrible taste. After another sip that I swallowed this time, I felt much better, though the headache hadn't let off at the least.

"What happened?" I finally asked, sinking back into the pillows. I still held my eyes closed, but slowly I started to become more aware of my environment and there was no doubt in my mind that I was in a hospital room. There was an annoying beeping sound coming from somewhere close by. Something had tugged at the back of my left hand as I had moved it, and I was pretty sure there was more than one pair of needles stuck into me.

"You had to play the bloody hero, that's what happened." Now my mother sounded angry, though I had the feeling it wasn't at me, but more at the situation in general. "Edward, I know we're not the best example there is, with us being practically indestructible and you, well, you are not, but if you ever do something as stupid as what you did today, I don't know what I'm going to do. You scared my to death."

I furrowed my brow – a bad move, as it aggravated my headache only more than before – and tried to remember.

I drew a blank.

My eyes flew open and I stared at my mother's face.

"I … I don't remember!" I said, shocked.

Rosalie sighed, then nodded, as if was something she had expected. "It's not an uncommon occurrence in the case of a head injury to loose the memory of the events that led to that injury," she said, sounding as if she was quoting some medical text. Maybe she did. After all, at one point in her life Rosalie had studied medicine and if she wanted, she could work as a physician.

"Damn," I only said.

"You might get the memory back, eventually," Rosalie pointed out with a smile, most likely to calm me.

"I still would like to know what happened," I said, looking at my mother hopefully.

She pursed her lips then nodded.

"This morning, at school, a van got out of control and nearly crushed that Swan girl. You know, Chief Swan's daughter."

"Bella," I breathed, my heart suddenly constricting. "Is she okay?"

Rosalie narrowed her eyes, a speculating glow in them. "She's fine. Thanks to you. You pushed her out of the way, but not fast enough to get to safety yourself. Idiot," she added under her breath.

"So she's fine?" I asked again desperately.

The thought that something might had happened to Bella was unbearable.

"She barely has a scratch on her body. A bruise at the back of her head where she hit the ground, that's it. Carlisle has checked her out, and she is perfectly all right."

I sighed in relief. If Carlisle had given her a clean bill of health then she was really okay.

"Thank God," I said, brushing a hand over my face.

"There might be a problem though," she said.

I tilted my head in question.

"We think she saw a little bit more than was good for her … and us."

"What did she see?" I asked with threat.

If she suspected something ..

My family had always survived by staying in hiding, blending in, being as normal as possible. There was no way they could hide forever that none of them aged, but usually, it was possible to fool other people for a couple of years at least. Normally, people believed what they were told.

When I had been eleven, there had been a man who had somehow noticed that something was unusual about Dr. Cullen and his beautiful family. He had been a reporter and had found out too much. From one day to another we had pulled up stakes and had moved to the other side of the country. The others had managed to destroy every proof the reporter had had before disappearing, so nobody had believed him when he had stepped out into the open, but it had been a close call, and none of us wanted a repeat of that incident.

Especially when this would mean that we would have to move away once again.

Away from Forks.

Away from Bella.

"After the accident, when we smelled your blood, Emmett and I, we lost a bit of control. Em pushed the cars aside to get to you, and I might have been a bit in a hurry to ascertain you were okay. She saw us, and I know she is wondering. She hasn't said anything, though. At least not so far."

I looked at her questioningly.

"Alice is keeping a watch on her for now. Which isn't too hard, as she's in the hospital waiting for a word on you."

"She is?" I asked, hopefully.

"Silly you, of course she is. You're her hero after all. Actually, it seems like half the school is here, though I wonder how many are using it as an excuse to skip class."

I thought about that for a moment. It was quite aggravating that I couldn't remember the accident. But if Bella thought about me as her hero, maybe that whole situation wasn't so bad after all.

"Okay, what's the diagnosis," I finally asked, bracing myself. I already knew I had a concussion and that something was wrong with my right arm, but I wanted the whole story.

"You're one big bruise pretty much from top to bottom. Your right collarbone is broken, the shoulder was dislocated. You have a laceration of you scalp, which had to be sewn up. And then there's the concussion. You were unconscious for more than half an hour after the accident, and only woke up for short periods of time since then, though you probably don't remember those. You'll be spending a few more days here and at home before you can go back to school."

She took a deep breath.

"It could have been worse though, and for that I'm grateful," she said in a low tone. "Just promise me you'll never do something that foolish again. I couldn't bear to lose you."

Her hand stroke gently over my face and she bowed down to place a soft kiss on my forehead.

"I love you."

"I love you, too, mom."

A knock at the door broke the moment and Rosalie pulled back, changing from the loving mother she was to the concerned older sister in the blink of an eye.

A nurse looked inside, and upon seeing me awake, she hustled Rosalie outside, while she checked me out, making sure I hadn't pulled any of the needles sticking in me. With the promise that the doctor would be with me in a moment, she got outside.

I was asleep, before Carlisle came into the room.

* * *

I slept a lot over the next couple of days. No matter how hard I tried, it seemed impossible for me to be awake for more than a couple of minutes, and I had the attention span of a gnat.

Even when Bella was allowed into my room later in the afternoon of the first day, I fell asleep less than a minute after she had entered. Normally I would have wanted to spend more awake time with her, but my body had other ideas.

Though I would just enjoy for her being there with me, I knew that I needed to talk to her, to find out what she really had seen after the accident. I hoped I would be able to convince her that whatever she had seen had been something normal, not some super-strong vampire desperately pushing cars aside in order to get to me.

When I woke up the second day, I was astonished that half my room was filled with flowers and get-well-soon balloons. The cards piled on my desk. I had had no idea that I was so popular.

Visitors were allowed only one at a time, and as my family acted as a screen, I only had to cope with a selected few persons.

The one person I had been looking for most came late in the afternoon after school was out. Thanks to the good drugs, my headache had receded into a distant corner of my brain and my shoulder pained me only when I made a wrong move. My stomach had eventually settled and I had been able to eat a little bit for lunch without the overwhelming urge to get rid of the food right away. Funnily, the last day had given me a bit of appreciation for the problems my family had with ingesting normal food. They could eat, but it wasn't something they liked – though 'not liked' was probably a huge understatement – and once the food was in, there was only one way to get it out again.

When there was a knock on the door, I actually felt pretty good, and when I saw Bella sticking her head in, I almost got giddy.

"Hi, Edward," she said as she entered, dragging a pair of bright colored balloons in with her.

"Bella," I breathed.

At once I looked her over, wanting to make sure that what Rosalie had said the day before was true. I couldn't see anything wrong with her, and I relaxed back into my pillows.

"Wow, you've got a lot of balloons in here," she said, looking around in my room, fingering the ribbons of the two she had brought. "No wonder I had problems finding any."

"But obviously you still did," I said with a smile.

She blushed, a delightful sight at any day and even better for it being because of something I had said. I loved the way it colored her cheeks.

"Well, I couldn't just show up with empty hands," she said, handing the balloons to me. Our fingers brushed and once again there was something like an electrical jolt passing between us.

"There was no need, really," I said, and immediately regretted it, for she looked away from me. I saw a tear trickle down her cheek and she brushed it away with her hand with an angry gesture.

Why was she crying?!?

"Bella?" I asked gently, cursing myself for whatever I had said to cause her pain. I wanted to wrap her into my arms. I wanted to hold her to me, to dry her tears, to make her feel better.

"It's nothing, really. Only, well, you know, there's nothing that ever …" she stammered, then stopped.

"There's nothing that ever what?" I prodded her on.

"You saved my life, Edward," she exclaimed, sounding almost angry.

I furrowed my brows.

"And that's a bad thing how?" I asked, now thoroughly confused. She was alive, unharmed, and there was nothing in the world that made me more happy than that fact.

She sighed, deflating. "That's not bad, Edward. It's just, these are just two stupid balloons and they are not even close to the gratitude I feel for what you have done for me. And you got hurt and I don't have a scratch on me, and that is just not fair."

I had to chuckle at that. She looked so adorable when she was confused.

"Bella," I said softly. "I don't exactly remember what happened yesterday, but I know whatever it was, I would do it again in a heartbeat. That I somehow managed to save you unhurt, it makes me more happy than you could ever imagine."

I reached out my good hand to her, but she didn't seem to see it, staring at me as if I suddenly had a second head.

"Bella?" I prompted her once more.

"Are you for real?" she asked in awe.

I couldn't help it and burst out laughing. Which was bad on oh so many different levels. For one, it jarred my shoulder and my arm informed me in no uncertain terms that it didn't like that a bit. My head was also not thrilled by the whole laughing thing and sent a little reminder in form of a painful spike that somehow ended up in my stomach. I had to swallow the bile that instantly started to rise in my throat. Yeah, it would be just brilliant if I managed to puke in front of Bella.

And then there was the hurt look in Bella's beautiful eyes.

"Ouch," I said, meaning it. "Sorry," I added in a dejected voice. "I didn't mean to make fun of you. It was just, your face just right now … Sorry."

Her face went through a whole host of emotions too fast for me to capture any one of them. In the end she settled on guarded worry.

"Are you okay?" she asked, obviously seeing my pained expression. My head was pounding and I wished for nothing more than to close my eyes and go to sleep. But that would mean that Bella would leave and I didn't want that to happen.

"I'm fine," I rasped out, hoping against hope she wouldn't see how I squinted my eyes. "Just a bit of a headache."

"This doesn't look like 'just a bit of a headache'," she said, looking around in the room searchingly. "Should I get the nurse?"

Getting pain killers sounded very tempting right now, but they would make me sleepy and I didn't want that.

"No, please, it will go away in a moment. Please just stay," I begged.

She hesitated, but then she nodded.

I settled back in my bed and closed my eyes, concentrating on my breathing. I heard her bustling around, pulling a chair closer to my bed. She sat down.

*

The next thing I knew were voices talking to each other in my room, both trying to be quiet, both failing. One belonged to my father, the other to Bella.

"I saw it, Emmett," Bella said angrily. "You pushed that car aside like it weighed nothing."

"I was panicked. It is a known fact that in extreme situations people can do things that are normally impossible. It was my brother there, under that car. You can believe me, there was lots and lots of adrenalin involved."

"No, I can't believe that. Even with a super amount of adrenalin there is no way you could have done what you did."

"I obviously did so I obviously could," Emmett retorted, slowly reaching the end of his fuse.

"And when did Rosalie get a medical degree?" Bella went on. "She performed a perfect triage there, got all the injuries Edward suffered and knew exactly what she had to do."

Uhoh, Bella had to attack Rosalie now. And there was nothing that riled Emmett more than an attack on my mother.

"Rosalie is the daughter of a doctor, in case you haven't noticed. There's a lot about her you don't know."

Well, that was a good point.

"But," Bella was about to go on, but got interrupted by Emmett.

"Just let it go," he said with a voice that allowed no refusal. "There were a lot of things going on and you had hit your head. Obviously you thought you saw some things that were not real or over-interpreted whatever you really saw. Everything has a perfectly reasonable explanation and nobody will believe anything else."

Everybody in his right mind would have dropped the argument right there and for a moment it seemed as if Bella would finally concede.

Obviously I underestimated her stubbornness.

"This is not over, Emmett. I know what I saw and what I saw was real. Something is weird about you and your family, and I will find out what it is."

I decided that now would be a good time to show them that I was awake – before Emmett came to the decision that the only way to guarantee the safety of our family was by killing Bella, which would have been very counterproductive to me having saved her life.

"Emmett?" I asked, sounding, and actually feeling, rather weak.

He was at the side of my bed in a flash – only figuratively of course, there was a witness in the room after all.

"Edward, I'm sorry, did we wake you?" There was no denying the worry in his eyes. I hope he would tone it down a little, after all officially he was only my brother, not my father.

"What time is it?" I asked. It was dark outside, but then it was January and the sun set early around here.

"9:15 in the evening," he told me after checking his wrist watch.

My eyes flew to Bella. "You've been here all the time?" I asked somewhat shocked. I would have expected her to leave a long time ago. When she had arrived it had been four in the afternoon. She'd been her more than five hours with nothing else to do than watching me. She had to be bored out of her mind.

She blushed and ducked her head. "You asked me to stay," she said in a low voice.

"Your father will be furious," I said, while a warm feeling trickled down my body. She had stayed all this time, just because I'd asked her to.

She had stayed for me.

"I called him earlier. He understands," she said. "He'd rather have me here with you than dead in the morgue. His words, not mine."

The thought of her in the morgue pained me more than I could express. My eyes must have shown some of it, though, and she also stepped to my side and took my hand.

"Edward, I can never repay you for what you have done for me. You saved me, and if that means sitting for a few hours in an uncomfortable plastic chair, then this is a very small price to pay."

I barely heard her though, my concentration on her warm hand in mine.

For a minute everyone was silent, then Emmett cleared his throat. "Well, Edward is awake now, and you should probably go home."

No, I wanted to say, I want her to stay, but instead I said, "Emmett is right. You've been here for hours."

She pulled her hand out of my grip and instantly I felt an indescribable loss. She ran her fingers through her hair, then picked up her bag and turned to the door. Before she left, however, she turned around once more, looking at me.

"Is it okay if I come again?" she asked. "I could bring my class notes and the homework."

Yes please.

"He'll be released tomorrow," Emmett said.

I looked at him in surprise. I hadn't known that I'd already been allowed to go home.

"Then I'll come to your house," she offered.

"Yes please," I said, before Emmett could stop me. With a look I begged him to not say anything. "It will be boring all day being on my own. Class notes would be great. Maybe on Friday?"

The smile she showed me before she slipped out was all I could ask for.

"Are you out of your mind?" Emmett turned to me angrily the moment the door had closed behind her. "Do you think that inviting her to a house full of vampires is good for her?"

"Showing her that we're perfectly normal people, will do a lot to alleviate her suspicions. You know that our house is as normal as can be. We have a kitchen and bathrooms and both are used. She will suspect nothing."

"It's a very bad idea," he said. "It's still a risk. She shouldn't come."

I didn't tell him that I didn't care about the risk for once. Just the thought that I would see Bella again was enough to make me insanely happy.

"I can't call her back now and tell her not to come. She's coming."

"She shouldn't," he said once again, but finally he dropped it.


	5. Chapter 5

As Emmett had announced, I was allowed to go home the next day. I had a whole bag of pain killers with me, and Carlisle promised he would make sure that I would get enough rest. With six overprotective vampires hovering over me, I had no doubt that every single order would be followed to the letter.

I wouldn't be allowed back to school at least before the end of the next week. My shoulder had been immobilized and my right arm was in a sling. My whole right side was a single, spectacular bruise and movement wasn't something I was too keen on because it friggin' hurt. My headache now came in waves, with the time span between each attack getting longer all the time. Whenever I left my bed I became dizzy and walking in a straight line was something that took way more effort than it should. At least the nausea had luckily subsided and my appetite had returned with a vengeance.

The night before I came home, the others had made sure that our house showed nothing that would indicate that six out of the seven people living there were anything other than normal happy people. The biggest issue had been that Rosalie and Emmett, and Alice and Jasper both shared a room. As we pretended that they were all siblings not two insanely in love vampire pairs, two of the unused rooms had been converted into living quarters for Jasper and Emmett. Though it was more than unlikely that Bella would ever step into one of their rooms, my family had the habit to be overly cautious, and so they prepared. Some of the more unusual items that used to adore our living room, like a huge wooden cross that Carlisle's father had made in the 17th century, disappeared into our basement, a place so protected, that even I normally couldn't go in.

Rosalie and Emmett picked me up at the hospital. My father had far too much fun pushing the blasted wheelchair out to the exit, where he had parked the Mercedes. As I moved slowly from the chair to the front seat, I felt like eighty years old.

Though I had done practically nothing but sleep for the last forty-eight hours, I still somehow managed to fall asleep again while we were driving home. I only woke when Emmett picked me out of the car and proceeded to carry me into the house.

"Lemme down," I protested. "I can walk on my own."

He chuckled and simply ignored me. I crossed my arms in front of me and sulked. He walked through our living room and then up the stairs to my room. There he placed me gingerly on my bed.

My mom handed me a pill and a glass of water.

"Take that," she commanded, not allowing for any protest.

I glared at her, but still I took the two pills and swallowed them down. I knew that there was no sense in fighting her.

"What now?" I asked, crossing my arms again, glowering at the two of them.

"Now you sleep," she said sternly.

"You got to be kiddin'. I've done nothing but sleep for the last two days. I'm not tired."

The last statement was followed by a wide yarn, and too late I slapped my hand over my mouth. My eye lids drooped. I decided the next time I wouldn't simply swallow whatever they handed me.

* * *

When I woke the next time, the room was dark and quiet. Even though I didn't hear a thing, I knew I wouldn't be alone. The only question was who would be the one guarding my sleep.

I loved my family, I really did. But sometimes they drove me sheer crazy with their over-protectiveness, though normally they did hide it much better than currently. I could understand them in a way. They loved me and they didn't want to loose me and it was a fact that I was far more breakable than any of them.

Still.

"I don't need a babysitter," I said into the darkness.

A soft chuckle told me all I needed to know.

"Jasper," I said, pleased.

My uncle was one of the most laid back people I knew. He held the wisdom of 170 years of life. My aunt Alice was the polar opposite, energetic to the point of obnoxiousness, and I thought this was one of the reasons the two of them fitted so well together.

Of course, there was also a dark side to him – darker than most other members of my family. Until he had met Alice fifty or so years ago, he had lived like most other vampires in the world - that was he had drunk human blood. He had had a hard time to adapt to my family's life style and I knew, in the beginning he had only followed their ways because of his love for Alice.

As I grew up, once in a while he had disappeared for weeks on end, and as a kid I hadn't been able to understand why my uncle had left us alone so often. Only later I had realized that it had been because he had been afraid to loose control around me, especially when I had come home with a scraped knee or a bloody nose. But in the last six or seven years he had always stayed and he had gotten much better in controlling his instincts.

"Are you going to send me back to sleep?" I asked, knowing that he didn't need any drugs to do that to me.

"You want me to?"

"God no," I protested. "I think I had slept enough to last me a lifetime."

"You're still healing, Edward. A concussion is nothing to joke around with."

"Tell me about it," I muttered, as I pushed myself into a sitting position. "But no matter what, I need to go to the bathroom and I need to do so now."

Like a flash he was at my side and helped me up. He supported me, but at least he didn't insist on carrying me. And he left me alone once I was in the bathroom.

I really loved my uncle!

Once I was done, I returned into my bedroom. Jasper had switched the light on for me, and I eyed my bed with apprehension. I really didn't want to go back in there.

"I think I've slept enough for now. Where are the others?"

"Your parents decided they needed to hunt after you invited Bella to visit us tomorrow. Carlisle is still at work, though he should be home in half an hour. Esme is in the kitchen making a cake and Alice is helping her."

For a moment I was distracted by the happy reminder that Bella would be coming here, but then Jasper mentioned food and I, or rather my stomach, knew what I wanted to do.

"You think they'll have something for me to bite?" I asked, already making for the stairs.

I felt stiff and when I reached the ground floor I was strongly reminded of every single bruise I had. But at least I hadn't fallen down the stairs, though I had to hang on the banister for the full trip. The moment I got into the kitchen a sandwich and a full glass appeared in front of me.

"Thanks, Esme," I said as I sat down. Considering that she didn't eat normal food, she was a fantastic cook and I would be the last to let the good food go to waste.

"How do you feel?" She wrapped her arms around me from behind and hugged me gently to herself.

"I'm fine," I said, having the feeling that I would use that phrase plenty of times over the next couple of days.

I sensed her turning towards Jasper who had joined his wife at the kitchen counter. My uncle held up his hands.

"Leave me out of this. When Edward says he's fine I will not tell you otherwise."

"Esme!" I protested. I turned in my chair and looked at her accusingly. Using Jasper's ability to check if I was telling the truth was not fair.

She had the decency to look chagrined. "I'm sorry, Edward, I just worry, and I know you'll want to downplay your injuries."

"I'm fine, really. I'm fine." I hoped that by repeating that statement she would finally accept it.

"All right," she sighed, stepping away from me.

I exhaled and then nodded. "I know you guys worry. And I understand. But I'm really, really fine. Or will be soon."

Luckily the timer on the oven chose that moment to go off. For the next couple of minutes Esme and Alice were busy with the cake, so I took the opportunity to sneak out and find myself a place in the living room. Jasper followed me, bringing my food with him.

"Thanks," I said as took the plate from his hand, meaning more than just him bringing me my sandwich.

He sat down next to me, watching me eat.

"They can be a bit much," he said, as I quietly chewed on my sandwich.

I shrugged my left shoulder – using the right wouldn't have worked – and nodded.

"What nobody is telling you, though, is how proud you've made everybody here. We may be a little bit mad at you for risking your life like that, but at the same time we know that you've done the right thing in saving Bella's life."

My eyes flew up from my food and for a moment I could only look at him with my mouth hanging open. I somehow had thought that my family was angry at me because I got myself injured and that I caused them worry.

I made them proud?

Jasper grinned as he took my chin and gently closed my mouth.

"Finish your sandwich. I believe you'll want a piece of that cake later."


	6. Chapter 6

* * *

As yesterday's offering was a bit on the shortish side, I decided to give you this part a bit earlier

* * *

My family left the house in the morning like every day, leaving only Esme and myself behind. She made sure I was safely stowed on the couch, with plenty of blankets wrapped around me, the remote controls for the DVD player, TV and stereo in easy reach and the last book I'd been reading sitting on the couch table waiting for me with something to drink next to it.

She then left me on my own, retreating to her study. I was very grateful she left me alone even though I knew that with a simple call I would have her at my side again faster than I could blink.

I finally had stopped falling asleep at any inopportune moment – like at dinner last night and later again while watching a movie – and felt content just sitting there, thinking and not move too much.

A lot had happened the last couple of days and I took my time to sort through it slowly. I still couldn't remember the actual accident, which sort of riled me. What good was it to be called a hero if you couldn't even remember what you had done to deserve that label?

Alice had given me a blow by blow description, including the vision that had started it all. There was no doubt that if I hadn't intervened, Bella would have been dead. I was a bit surprised that none of the others had intercepted me as I had dashed across the parking lot to save her. It would have been very simple for any in my family to stop me before I reached her, and there was even a good chance nobody else would have noticed them doing it. Alice simply said that it had been meant to happen and left it at that. Sometimes I didn't understand her and I doubted anybody else in my family did.

One thing that had become very clear to me, though, was that I was in love with Bella Swan. I didn't know what it was, really, why I was in love with her, but the fact of the matter was I was. Just the thought of her crushed between the two cars caused me nearly physical pain and to imaging she could be dead was more than I could bear. When she was near me, I felt happy. When she was touching me, I nearly forgot to breathe, my heart beating like crazy. When she was gone, I felt like all air had gone from the room and the light had been replaced by darkness.

I didn't know what Bella was thinking of me and that drove me nearly to madness. It was obvious she was grateful for me saving her life, but other than that I didn't know. I thought we had made some small progress the day before the accident, and that, at least, she didn't despise me any more, but that wasn't enough for me. It could never be enough for me.

My thoughts were racing each other around inside my brain and I felt another headache coming.

I hadn't known I had emitted a moan until Esme appeared in the living room and knelt down next to my place.

"Are you in pain, Edward?" she asked worry coloring her voice.

"I'm fine," I repeated my mantra. "A small headache, that's all."

She watched me doubtingly, probably suspecting me to downplay the pain I was in. "You want some Paracetamol?" she then asked.

I shook my head. "Nah, I have enough of pills for now. It will go away on its own. I'll just take a nap."

Still looking at me with uncertainty she finally nodded, helped me to settle down and tucked the blanket closer around me. I closed my eyes, feeling her cool fingers caressing my forehead.

But for once sleep eluded me. I guess my body had finally decided it had slept enough for now. Not that I could blame it – I had slept more in the last three days than normally in a week. I tried to deepen my breath, to fake sleeping, so Esme could go back to whatever she had been doing, but I should have know that I couldn't fool her.

"Edward," she said gently, her caress never once stopping. The coolness of her hand was better than an ice pack would have been. My headache was already receding.

I sighed and opened my eyes, then struggled to get back into a sitting position. She switched her place to sit with me on the couch, wrapping her right arm around me.

"Do you want to talk?" she asked, her golden eyes fixed on me.

No, not really. But I also knew that if I didn't talk to somebody I might explode.

"Esme, I hope you don't mind me asking that, but when did you know you were in love with Carlisle?"

Her bell-like laughter filled the room. "The moment I laid eyes on him," she said, smiling at the memory. "I was sixteen and had broken my leg climbing a tree. He was the doctor who treated me and the moment I saw him, I knew he was the one. He was so unbelievably handsome and there was something in his golden eyes that drew me to him like a magnet. But I was young. In those time, you didn't necessarily marry for love and he did move away shortly after my accident. I now know I had been too young for him and also that he did it to protect me, but back then it had hurt."

I almost could feel the pain at that loss, even though it had been almost a hundred years ago.

"I didn't see him again for ten years. You know my life wasn't really a happy one, and that I tried to kill myself. I remember the pain after he bit me, though I couldn't remember him biting me. I only knew I had deserved the pain for committing suicide. But then it was gone and I saw my angel again and he smiled at me and it was as if the ten years before hadn't happened and my feelings for him was as strong as ever."

I had heard that story before, of course, as I've been told how every one of my family had been changed. But watching her, her eyes distant, a fond smile on her lips, I almost could feel how it had been for her.

"And how did you know he loved you?" I asked then. How do you know that the person you love more than your life, loves you in return? How would I know that Bella liked me and maybe even, one day, love me?

"Ah," she said as if she finally had put something together she had been wondering about but hadn't wanted to ask on her own. "He told me so, but actually there had been no need for that. It was the way he looked at me, the way my name sounded when he spoke it. His kiss. After he had found me again there was never any doubt in my mind that he loves me as much as I love him. He had been so lonely for so long and I … I made him complete. And he made me complete.

"But this is not about Carlisle and me, right? Is it about this girl you saved? Bella?"

I was about to deny it, but something told me that I could trust her with my secret, so I simply nodded.

"You like her?"

Well, liking her was a big understatement. Still I nodded again.

"You like her a lot," she didn't ask this time, but merely stated a fact.

"Yes," I said exhaling. "I'm crazy about her. I can't stop thinking about her. But I don't even know if she likes me or not."

I blamed the concussion. There was no other explanation why I sounded like such a looser all of a sudden.

"Edward, you saved her life. I don't think it's possible for her not to like you." Esme chuckled softly.

"But I don't want her to like me just because I saved her life. I want her to like me because of me," I complained.

Yes, there was no doubt, it was the concussion. I must have knocked something loose in my brain when I got hit by the van. All that was missing was that I broke out in tears.

Esme sighed and turned so she could place her hands left and right of my face. She looked into my eyes, her own topaz eyes dark and intense.

"Edward, you are an amazing young man. You are compassionate, loyal and brave. You are smart and fun and you are not exactly bad looking, if I may say so. If your Bella has any sense at all, she will very soon do much more than just like you. She will have no choice. We, for sure, never had."

She gave my head a small shake as if to push her words further in then let me go.

Slightly stunned I watched her as she got up and walked out of the room leaving me behind, wondering what I had done to deserve her words.

*

The rest of the morning and the early afternoon passed by quickly. Only when the hour came closer when school normally ended time suddenly slowed to a crawl. At last Rosalie, Emmett, Jasper and Alice showed up, asking me how I was feeling and how my day had been. I answered only half-heartedly, my mind on the thought that it now couldn't be long before Bella finally, finally would come.

I knew she was coming when my family all suddenly looked up and faced the entrance door. They must have heard Bella's truck as she drove up the winding street that led to our house. I wanted to get up and welcome her, but Emmett placed a hand on my good shoulder forcing me to remain seating.

Rosalie greeted Bella at the door and let her in.

I was sitting on the couch in such a way that I could watch her as she was coming in with a stunned expression on her face. He mouth was shaped into a small 'O' and her lovely eyes were wide as she spun slowly around.

Finally she saw me on the couch and immediately she stepped closer.

"Hi Bella," I said. I wanted to jump up to lead her to a seat next to me, but Emmett never had let go of me, standing behind the couch as if he was guarding me.

"You've got quite a house here," she said with awe in her voice. "It's huge."

"We're a big family," I said in way of an explanation.

Esme showed up in the passage between the kitchen and the living room. I knew she loved the house and had put a lot of effort into it to make it as lovely as it was. Normally it didn't take much to have her talk about it, but though I would have expected it from her, she didn't walk up to Bella and take her hand. Instead she remained where she was, watching Bella with a guarded expression. She did smile, but the smile didn't really reach her eyes. Casting one last look at Bella she returned again into the kitchen.

Alice and Jasper had both disappeared in their room, so only my parents were left in the room with us. They both shared a quick glance with each other, then they also headed for the stairs.

"We have a lot of homework to do," Rosalie said, her hand on the banister. "I'm sure Bella will find her way out when she leaves."

With an open mouth I watched as my parents walked up the stairs and disappeared on the next floor. I've never seen Rosalie being so rude to anybody. Sure, she could be nasty if she wanted to be and more than one boy in school had fled from her presence with his tail on fire, but for her being so rude to the girl I loved …

Something was wrong here.

But Bella was here and the last thing I wanted was to waste time thinking about my family's behavior. So I turned back to Bella, who also looked a little bit shell shocked, and smiled.

"You brought your notes?" I asked.

"Uh, yes, of course. But I really can't stay long. I need to go."

My face fell. I had been looking so much forward to Bella's visit that I had totally forgotten that she might have other plans for the evening. It was Friday, after all. Maybe she already had a date.

Jealousy rose in me.

"Sorry, Edward," she said, suddenly very close to me. I hadn't even noticed that she had stepped closer. "I need to get home to get dinner ready for my dad. He's hopeless in the kitchen and would burn the water if left alone for too long."

Not a date then. Relief flooded me.

I inhaled deeply, noticing for the first time the scent of freesias that surrounded her. Why hadn't I noticed that delightful aroma before? I took another breath just so I could get another whiff of it.

"It's alright, though I had hoped you could keep me company for a little bit longer. Preferably when I wasn't sleeping," I said, trying to hide my disappointment.

"I'm truly sorry, Edward," she said, sounding like she meant it, and this made me feel a little bit better. "Charlie, well, my dad, he's a bit overprotective right now with me almost dying in that accident and all. So I try to show him that I'm okay and that nothing will happen to me."

Well, I could understand that. An overprotective family was nothing new to me.

She bent down to reach into her bag and pulled out her notebook. She handed me a Xerox of her biology notes and homework. Then she got up again.

"If you want, I'll come again next week," she offered. "How long do you think until you can come back? Bio is getting a bit lonely without you," she added as in an afterthought.

Did that mean she missed me?

I told her that I'd be off school until at least the end of the next week, and she promised to bring me her notes every single day.

Then she was gone and it felt my heart had left with her.


	7. Chapter 7

The week following the accident never seemed to end. My family did everything they could to entertain me, but, really, what I lived for were the short visits by Bella, who came by without fail every afternoon after school to bring me her notes. I was thinking of ways to make her stay longer than the five minutes or so she usually was here, but without much success.

My family wasn't exactly helping. Without saying anything, they made her feel unwelcome. As soon as she showed up in the afternoon, they made themselves scarce, disappearing into other sections of the house, but never without giving Bella an unfriendly look. I didn't know what to think of it, but never had an opportunity to ask any of them.

Her short visits didn't give me much time to work out what she was thinking of me. She didn't hate me, of that I was now sure. She also seemed to like me at least a little bit, else she wouldn't drive all the way to my house for five days straight just to give me some damn notes she could have given anybody in my family during school. It might have been out of a sense of obligation to the guy who had saved her life and who was bound to his house because of that, but I doubted that.

Not knowing for sure, however, did drive me crazy.

Naturally, my behavior didn't go unnoticed by my family as they were all watching me like a mother bird is watching her chick.

On Friday after Bella had left, I heard a knock at the door of my room.

At last I had started to feel better. I barely had any headaches anymore, the dizziness and nausea were both completely gone. I finally could move again, the bruises on my side had almost completely faded. The only remainders of the accident were the healing scar on the right side of my head, and my shoulder, which was still immobilized and would be for at least two more weeks.

"Come in," I said, reducing the volume of the music I had been listening to. I had been lying on my bed, my thought, as usual nowadays, on Bella, but now I sat up to see who was coming in.

"Edward, we're having a family conference," my father said, standing in the door frame.

"About what?" I asked carefully. If there was a family conference than something serious was going on. Like somebody had slipped up and we're going to move once again. Move away from Forks and away from Bella.

I had a bad feeling about this.

As my father didn't answer my question, I got up from my bed and followed him down the stairs.

Even though I was the only one in the family to actually eat normal food, we had a huge dining table, big enough to host a dinner party of ten people. My family was already there. Carlisle sat as usual at the head of the table, Esme at his side. Rosalie and Alice sat on either side of him, only Jasper remained standing. He was leaning against the wall, his arms crossed in front of him. Emmett took his seat next to Rosalie and I followed him. There was an uncomfortable quiet surrounding the table.

"What is this about?" I asked no one in particular, not able to stand the silence.

"Bella," Emmett said.

Her name guaranteed my full attention.

Emmett's face was unreadable, but on Carlisle's and Esme's faces I saw something like sorrow.

"Has something happened to her?" I asked, my heart pounding in my chest. My eyes searched Jasper. If one of my family had slipped up, it was most likely him.

But his eyes were still golden, as were everybody else's.

"No," Rosalie said, "not yet."

"What do you mean with 'not yet'? Nothing is going to happen to Bella, you hear me!" I glared at my mother, challenging her to explain what she meant.

She took one unnecessary breath. "We didn't want to tell you, not at first, but there's a problem with Bella."

"What problem? Is it about what she saw? She hasn't told anyone yet, you know that. And she won't tell anybody."

"We know," Rosalie continued. "At least not until she has something else. It would be our word against hers and as what she saw is quite impossible, nobody would believe her.

"No, it's something else. It's Bella herself."

I furrowed my brows, confused. I felt a headache coming that had nothing to do with my healing concussion.

"What's wrong with her?"

"Nothing wrong, per se."

I wanted to scream when Rosalie paused once again. Why didn't she just tell me?

"What. Is. Wrong. With. Her?" I asked once again from behind clenched teeth.

"Her scent," she finally said.

"Her scent?" I repeated, incredulous.

Jasper pushed himself away from the wall and walked to sit next to Alice.

"You know how every person smells differently to a vampire," he started slowly.

Vampire 101. I had had the lecture before.

I simply nodded.

"Some people do smell more appealing than others, and sometimes there's a person that smells extremely alluring, practically irresistible."

I few things made click in my head and some loosely connected puzzle pieces fell into place. How Emmett had reacted when I had invited her over. How Esme had acted the first day Bella had been here. How Jasper was never around when she came. Small things I hadn't paid too close attention to before.

And, of course, her delightful smell which even I, who was not a vampire, found very attractive.

"She is one of those who smell so good to you?" I asked quietly, already knowing their answer.

Rosalie nodded. "So far, we've been able to resist. But it's ... painful. You know that deep down we are monsters, driven by our instincts. We may deny this part of us, but the thirst, the need is always there, as much as we want to deny it. And having her around ... "

Having her around here, in our house, might prove to be too much. One of my family might lose control.

"Then I won't invite her over again," I said, offering the simplest solution. I could live with seeing her only at school or at other places away from my home.

"This won't work," Alice spoke up. She had been quiet so far, just watching me. "I'm so sorry, Edward, but I have seen her future. And there's no doubt. If Bella and you are getting together, she will be killed by a vampire. I don't know who it will be and when, but every time I look for her future, she is dead."

"No!" I cried jumping off my seat, toppling the chair over.

Belly couldn't die. She. Could. Not. Die.

"You are wrong!" I exclaimed. "She can't die. Not by one of you. You are too good at this. There hasn't been a slip up in twenty years. Here, look at me. I've been around every single day for the last seventeen years, a meal ready-to-eat, and none of you even thought about taking a bite."

Jasper raised one hand, obviously wanting to point out that most certainly he at least had had some thoughts. Everybody ignored him.

"Edward," Alice said again. "I have looked and looked and looked, and there hasn't been one scenario where she doesn't die."

"You've been wrong before," I yelled at her accusingly.

"Yes," she admitted, her eyes downcast. "But never about something so important."

"Edward," Jasper intervened. "You have to understand how irresistible her scent is to us. I would leave if it's what I have to do to keep her safe, but Alice doesn't see who is killing her, and even though I'm the prime candidate, it might be one of the others. So the only solution would be for us all to leave."

"Leave here?" I asked, shocked.

Even though I had been thinking that this conference might be about us leaving Forks, now that the words had fallen, I couldn't comprehend the thought. It was as if all oxygen had left the air surrounding me and breathing became difficult for me. I felt dizzy, swaying where I was standing.

A cold, strong arm found my shoulders and led me to another chair, forcing me to sit down. I had no idea who aided me.

"We are not going to leave," Carlisle now spoke up and my eyes flashed to his face.

"No?" I asked confused. Hadn't Jasper just told me that we had to go away. What was it now?

He sighed. "We had already decided that we would leave, when Alice checked for Bella's future again. We expected her to be safe after the decision was made, but instead she saw that Bella will still die."

"Bella will still die?" I sounded like a damn parrot.

Distantly I noticed that my family had made the decision to move away from here without even asking me what I thought about it, but for some reason I couldn't care. This was about Bella, not me.

"Yes. Again, too many variables to be sure how, but she will not be alive come summer."

Suddenly, my anger evaporated. Bella would die. She would be dead in less than half a year. And it would be my fault, for I had drawn her into this madness. Sometimes I hated my family. Why couldn't I just live with some normal people? Why did it have to be a bunch of fucking vampires?

Pleadingly I looked up, searching the sympathetic faces of my family for an answer.

"What can I do?" I asked, sounding hollow even to my own ears.

"Stay away from her," Rosalie said, her eyes full with compassion.

Stay away from her? Anything but that! How could I stay away from her, when I just had found her?

"Edward, I know you feel a lot for her," Esme finally spoke up, her voice soft and gentle. "And this will be so hard for you. But you need to do this, for her sake."

"How does me staying away from her, but us staying in Forks ensure her safety? I don't understand." I looked up pleadingly.

"We don't know," Esme admitted. "We only know that if we stay too close to her, she will be killed by a vampire. If we leave, her death will be caused by something else. You already saved her once, so maybe if we watch her from afar, we can save her without putting her in danger by us. It will be a dangerous balancing act."

I slowly nodded. If staying away from her ensured she would live then I would do it. I could do that. I had to do it.

"Alice?" I asked, my voice harsh. "Will she stay alive, if I leave her alone?"

I needed to know.

"I'm sorry, but until you've made the decision - I mean really made it - the future won't change, and I won't see it. You aren't decided yet."

If I haven't cursed Alice's strange gift so far, I did so now.

"I need to think about it," I said in a whisper.

I got up and turned away from my family. From the people I still love, even though, right now, they were destroying my future.


	8. Chapter 8

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AN: I'll be vacation the next week without my computer and don't know if and when I'll have a chance to update on this story. Sorry for any delay because of that.

That shouldn't stop you from reviewing though ....

* * *

After a long, miserable weekend Monday finally arrived. I had spent most of my time in my room, listening to music, thinking about Bella and how I could leave her alone.

Finally, I had come to the conclusion that I had no choice. I would let her go her own path without me. I didn't know, didn't even believe, actually, that she wanted me the way I wanted her. I would end this before it even started and her life would be happier for it.

Once the decision had solidified, Alice had come to my room, telling me that now Bella would live. She wouldn't be killed by a vampire and she would still be alive in summer. Other than that nothing was sure, her future very much in a flux.

I told myself that this was enough, that this was all I wanted, and hoped that if I repeated it often enough, I would eventually start to believe it.

I threatened to go back to school, to see Bella again. What only a few days ago had filled me with giddy expectation, now only posed the potential for pain.

How would I be able to stay away from her?

How could I live without her?

Things weren't made easier by the fact that once I turned up at school on Monday I was celebrated like a damn hero. The school paper wanted to write an article on Bella and me, which I vehemently refused to allow much to the obvious relief of Bella, who hated the publicity. I would have refused on principle, as any kind of exposure was unwelcome, but now I was particular adamant, and borderline rude.

I couldn't refuse the congratulation of the school principal, though. I couldn't afford to piss him off, either, so I smiled and said thank you, and hoped he would shut the hell up. At least Carlisle, who had come to school with us that day, managed to convince him not to make a public spectacle out of it in front of the whole student body. I know I had come across as an idiot, but I didn't care.

There wasn't much I cared about any longer.

Bella began casting strange glances in my direction when I started to ignore her, but I didn't give her any explanation. Actually, I stopped talking to her altogether.

During most of a day it was quite possible to get out of her way. I had memorized her class schedule and made sure I was someplace else whenever she moved through the corridors. At lunch I sat at our usual table, boxed in by Emmett and Jasper. Rosalie or Alice usually got the food for me, so there was no risk of her accidently standing next to me in the food line. Not that I had much of an appetite anyway.

The only time of the day I couldn't completely ignore her was during Biology. I seriously thought about ditching the class, it wasn't as if I needed the credit. My grades were near perfect and I had some additional credits from some online advanced placement program I took part in. But as much as part of me feared to be close to Bella for those sixty minutes every day, another part, a part far more vocal, was looking forward to it in some twisted, sick, self-flagellating way. Just to be near her, to see her, to sit next to her. Even if it were sixty minutes of torture, as I wouldn't and couldn't touch her, or even talk to her, those sixty minutes seemed to be the only time in the day I felt sort of alive.

Bella, naturally, quickly picked up that something had changed. She wasn't stupid. But she couldn't figure out why I, who had obviously been overjoyed every time she came to my house only a few days ago, now only gave her the silent treatment. Several times she tried to start a conversation, but as I didn't reply to anything she said, she finally gave up and left me alone. The hurt look she gave me after I snubbed her again and again broke my heart.

As the days dragged on, I started to sleep badly. I was having nightmares, with Bella in the starring role. At first I replayed the accident. Even though I still couldn't really remember it, my sub-consciousness obviously had enough of an imagination to fill out the details. Only in my dreams I was always too late and I saw her crushed and broken on the ground, covered in her own blood. Later my dreams got more creative. My family got invited as well, killing her in various ways, drinking her blood while I was watching them, unable to move, unable to save her.

My personal favorite, though, was the one where I was the monster and I watched myself plunging my hand into her chest to rip out her heart, only to devour the still beating organ, reveling in the taste of her blood. And then I looked down at her glassy, dead eyes, and that was the moment I woke up screaming.

When my parents, who naturally realized something was very wrong, tried to help me, I yelled at them to leave me alone. Hadn't I just seen Emmett tear out Bella's throat? Hadn't I just seen Rosalie drinking Bella's blood, her eyes turning crimson as she laughed like a mad person? Just the thought of them being with me in the same room repulsed me, and finally they left me alone, though I saw the hurt in their eyes. I wouldn't tell them what I dreamed about, though, so they didn't understand.

Of course I couldn't leave myself alone, so all that was left for me was to hate myself. I never did anything to myself – it wouldn't be right – but I did put in some serious thinking about it.

I tried to forego sleeping altogether, but obviously that didn't work. So in the end I asked Carlisle to get me some sleeping aids, which he finally – reluctantly – agreed to. The pills did make me pass out and I slept without dreams, but somehow in the morning I felt worse than when I had gone to bed the night before.

I don't know exactly how long this went on. I sort of lost track of time. I didn't live, I simply existed. Every day the same painful routine. Get up in the morning. Go to school. Wait for biology and then suffer through the one single hour I allowed myself to be with her in the same room every day. Get home and stay in my room until it was time to go to bed. Take my pills.

Press repeat.

On every second Saturday I still went to the hospital, but it didn't bring me joy any more. Mrs. Jackson immediately picked up on my mood and tried to find out what was wrong with me, but as I didn't want to share my misery with her, she eventually gave up, and we stayed with safer topics from then on.

At least the weather seemed to follow my mood. It was raining throughout February, the sun never making a single appearance.

I had hoped that with time it would get easier for me, that I would get used to the idea that I couldn't be with her. But actually every day it got a little bit harder. More than once I caught myself only at the very last moment from addressing her, by calling up the memories from my nightmares, the picture of her how she had lain there in her own blood, dead. It was just enough to seal my lips.

But it was so unbelievably hard.


	9. Chapter 9

* * *

New chapter posted from Key West today. Next updates as soon as I can get to another computer.

Please let me know what you think of the story.

* * *

One day, it might have been five or six weeks since the accident, Mr. Banner came into biology with a blood testing kit.

"The Red Cross is having a blood drive in Port Angeles next weekend, so I thought you should all know your blood type. Those of you who aren't eighteen yet will need a parent's permission - I have slips at my desk."

As he was demonstrating with Mike Newton's help how the test was done, I noticed Bella paling next to me. I hadn't thought it to be possible, as she was so pale to begin with, but now her face had a distinctly pasty color. Sweat broke out on her forehead and she lowered her head onto the top of the desk.

I felt my heart stop. What was wrong with her?

"Bella, are you all right?" Banner asked sounding alarmed. It was nothing to the alarm I felt.

"I already know my blood type, Mr. Banner," she said with a weak voice. She didn't move, her breath coming laborious.

I strained to reach out to her, to check her for fever or something, but stopped myself just at the last possible moment.

"Are you feeling faint?" Banner asked, as if this wasn't obvious.

"Yes, sir," she muttered almost imperceptibly.

This was it. Bella was obviously sick and I couldn't just sit next to her as if nothing was going on. All the effort I had put into the last couple of week to stay away from her seemed suddenly meaningless. The walls I had built up around myself crumbled into dust

Bella was in pain and that was something I simply couldn't allow. I had to help her and damn the consequences. I knew I had lost the battle. As if I ever had had any real chance.

"I'll take her to the nurse," I offered, already placing an arm around her waist and wrapping her arm over my shoulder. "I'm already giving blood at the hospital, so I know my blood type, Sir," I told Banner.

"Thank you, Edward." Banner sounded relieved.

"Can you walk?" I asked Bella gently. I wouldn't mind carrying her, but I knew she was proud and she would be very much embarrassed by it.

She cast me a look of total surprise and shock, as if only now she had realized it was me who was supporting her.

"Are you talking to me again?"

"I'm asking you a question, that's not talking. So what is it? Can you walk?" I asked her again.

"Yes," she whispered, her eyes still on my face as if she was trying to find out what was going on in my head. If she only knew.

We got up and I guided her slowly through the room and towards the exit. She could walk, but only barely.

We made it around the edge of the cafeteria when I sensed her weight on me increasing. It felt like she'd pass out any moment.

Without a second thought I scooped her up into my arms and carried her the rest of the way. She wasn't heavy, not at all. The weight of her body in my arms felt wonderful. It felt … right.

"Put me down!" she protested weakly, her small fist pounding against my chest ineffectively. I ignored her weak attempts. I wanted her in the hand of the nurse as quickly as possible.

"I don't think so," I said, feeling the muscles on my face shifting in an unfamiliar pattern. Then I realized I was smiling. I hadn't smiled for a long time.

She looked at me as if I had lost my mind.

Which I had.

And I felt more happy for it than I had in the last weeks.

I knew my family would be disappointed in me. I had promised I'd stay away from Bella in order to protect her life, but in doing so I had destroyed my own. Staying away from her had simply become an impossibility. I was too weak to do it any longer. I swore to myself I would find a way to protect her still. I would do anything to ensure that. Anything but staying away from her any longer.

I would find a way to keep her safe.

I had to.

I opened the door to the office and stepped inside, Bella still secure in my arms.

"Oh my," Ms. Cope the receptionist gaped as she jumped up from behind her desk.

"She fainted in Biology," I explained, making my way past the front counter and towards the nurse's door. The school nurse looked up from a book she was reading, looking startled.

I placed Bella on a paper covered cot, then stepped back to give the nurse room to check her over. The moment I let go of her, I felt an instant loss and I had to force myself not to get close to her again.

"She's just a little faint," I explained to the nurse, hoping I was sounding calm. "We've been blood typing in Biology."

"There's always one," she nodded knowingly. "Just let her lie down for a minute and it will pass. I'll get you some ice for your head. That will help."

She left the room, leaving us alone for the moment.

Bella was glowering at me, but I was too happy right now to be annoyed by it. Now that I had accepted that staying away from her was impossible, just being with her made me happy.

"Why are you grinning like that?" she asked irritated.

"I'm just in a good mood," I said. It was the truth after all.

"So you are talking to me again?"

I nodded. "I'm sorry about that. I really am, but I had my reasons."

"What reasons?"

I sighed. "Maybe one day I can tell you."

"You're not making any sense," she complained.

"I know." What else could I tell her? It was the truth after all.

The nurse came back with an ice pack, telling Bella to place it on her forehead.

I looked at her and found that her color had improved by quite a bit. She was still pale, but nothing like the chalky white her skin had been a few minutes ago.

"You can now go back to class," the nurse informed me.

I had no intention to leave Bella alone again - now or ever. "Mr. Banner told me to stay with Bella until she's better."

It wasn't true, technically, but as there was nothing new that Banner could show me today, I saw nothing in that little white lie.

I could sense that the nurse was about to challenge my claim, but just then there was a knock at the door and Mike Newton stumbled in, propping up another boy from our class.

Bella jumped off her cot, suddenly looking very pale again. I was confused why she should suddenly be faint again when a moment ago she had been fine, but then I noticed the blood on the other boy's finger and realized what the problem had to be. She had a problem with blood. I had to grin at the irony.

Once outside the room she leaned against the wall of the office. I watched her closely for any sign she might pass out, but color was quickly returning to her face.

"You want to go outside into the fresh air?" I offered her.

She nodded and I began to guide her to the office door.

Mike came out of the nurse's station, a look of pure loathing directed at me. He quickly stepped up to us, his attention now focused on Bella, ignoring me.

"Are you all right?" he asked, obviously concerned.

I had to suppress a stab of jealousy.

"I'm fine." She sounded annoyed at the question. I remembered the time after the accident and how everybody had asked me that question every five minutes and I could very much sympathize with her.

"Are you still on for the weekend? For the beach?" he then asked.

My head shot up, staring at Newton. I hadn't realized that Bella had been invited to go to somewhere on the weekend. Where? When? With whom?

"I said, I'd come," she replied shortly.

Unperturbed, he grinned. "Okay. We're meeting at my dad's store then, at ten. I'm going to tell the others."

"I'll be there," she promised.

"I'll see you in Gym," he said, then - finally - he turned and went back to class.

"Gym," she said with a groan, placing her head in her hands. Obviously she wasn't too eager about going to Gym today. Not that I really blamed her. One thing I had heard early on was that Bella and sports didn't mix well, though I never had the pleasure to experience it first hand.

I had an idea.

"I can help you with that."

"What?" she looked up confused.

God, she was just so adorable when she looked like that. Pushing that thought quickly aside, as it didn't have a place here right now, I told her to sit down and look pale.

She seemed to have no problem following my instructions and I wondered for a moment if it would be better if I brought her back to the nurse's station after all. But then she cast me a glance from behind her fingers and I knew that she was only playacting. Or at least for the most part.

"Ms. Cope," I addressed the receptionist, who had returned to her desk and was now typing something into her computer.

Ms. Cope looked up and I smiled at her. "Bella has Gym next and I don't think she's up to it. I actually think I should take her home. Do you think you could excuse us from class?"

She looked over to Bella, who now leaned her head against the wall, looking miserable. She was a better actor than I had given her credit for. It least I hope she was only acting.

"Of course, dear," Ms. Cope said. "I'll take care of it. You get better soon, Bella," she finally called across the room.

"Thank you," I said and returned to Bella's side.

I helped her up, acting as if she really needed my help just to walk. Truthfully, I just was looking for an excuse to touch her, to be near her.

Outside, she quickly drew away from me, and with regret I let her go.

"What's the matter with you, Edward?" She glared as me.

"What do you mean?" I asked, but I had a feeling I knew what this was about.

"I don't get you," she complained. "First you save my life, then you ignore me for five weeks, and now, all of the sudden, you're talking to me again as if nothing ever happened. I'm going to get whiplash if this goes on."

I sighed. I had to give her some explanation. Only what?

"I'm tired of staying away from you." There, nothing but the truth. Though 'tired' was only a fraction of what I was feeling. It was impossible for me now to leave her alone. I just couldn't.

It was a simple as that.

"Then why did you stay away from me to begin with?"

"Because it's safer for you," I blurted out before I could stop myself.

"What?" She stared at me with large eyes. "You're not making sense. Are you a serial killer or do you have a deadly, contagious disease?"

"No, of course not, don't be ridiculous. I only have your best interest in mind."

"Then why? Why? Explain it to me," she pleaded, and for a moment I almost caved.

"I can't," I said, defeated. "I wish I could, but I can't. I swear to you."

She took a lungful of air, visibly making an effort to calm down. She bit her lower lip, looking downwards for a couple of seconds. I held my breath.

When she looked up again, she seemed to be calmer. "All right," she said. "I'll let it be for now. But don't you think I'm giving up on this. I want to know what's up with you and I will find it out eventually."

I considered it a fair warning.

I smiled, holding out my hand. "Friends?" I asked softly.

She looked at my hand, then at my face. Finally, she nodded and took the proffered appendage.

"Friends."

Together we walked towards the parking lot, though in my case I felt like I was floating.

"So, you're having plans for the weekend?" I asked as if I only tried to make idle conversation. But in truth I needed to know.

"Yeah," she confirmed. "A couple of kids from our year are going down to La Push on Saturday. You want to come too?" She sounded almost hopeful. As if she really wanted me to come.

La Push. Damn. Technically, I wasn't allowed there. Well, not me specifically. It was my family that was forbidden to enter the reservation, thanks to an ancient treaty that Carlisle had hashed out with the tribal elders some seventy years ago.

I almost said I'd come nevertheless, but then I remembered that I had to work at the hospital on Saturday. I took my duty seriously and they relied on me showing up.

"I'm sorry," I said, meaning it. "I won't have time. I'm volunteering at the hospital this Saturday."

"Wow," she replied. I thought I sensed a little bit disappointment as well. "This must be tough."

"No, it's actually quite interesting," I warmed up to the topic. "I hope to be a doctor one day."

"Bummer about Saturday still."

She actually sounded disappointed and it warmed my heart. For a second I allowed myself to imagine us walking along the beach, holding each others hands. The waves were lapping against our feet and I caught Bella as she was jumping back from the water edge.

I was so immersed in my little fantasy I hadn't noticed we had reached the parking lot.

Bella turned left to head for her truck, but I reached for her arm and held her back.

"We're taking my car," I informed her and began to pull her towards the other end of the lot where the Volvo was parked.

"I'm perfectly capable of driving home by myself," she protested, her voice beginning to sound angry. She tried to pull away from me, but I held fast.

As if I would leave her out of my sight now. I knew I put her in danger just by being with her, but as it was now clear to me that I couldn't leave her alone, I would do my damnest to protect her as well as I could.

"You heard what I told Ms. Cope," I reminded her. "I'm going to drive you home."

"But that was only so I could get out of Gym," she now said.

"Yeah, and if anybody found out you drove yourself, then they will know you just faked it."

"What about my truck? How do I get it home?"

"I'll ask one of my brothers to bring it over," I said simply.

I was in deep enough shit as it was, just adding this to the pile wouldn't make any difference. Though the thought of either Emmett or Jasper in that crawling piece of ancient engineering was somewhat amusing. I wondered if they might end up pushing the truck to Bella's place, just to satisfy their need for speed, for it would most certainly be faster.

"Besides, just half an hour ago you almost passed out. Do you really think I would let you drive on your own?"

We had reached the Volvo and I used the remote to unlock the doors. I hadn't let go of Bella, still, and now I used my free hand to open the passenger door for her.

"Get in."

Surprisingly she didn't protest any further and allowed me to close the door once she was inside. As I walked around the car to get to my side, I couldn't help but grin widely.

I started the car and one of my favorite pieces of music filled the car's interior: The Suite Bergamasque by Debussy. I didn't exactly know what it was about that piece, but it always managed to calm me. It was one of the recordings I had made last year and I was pretty proud on how it had turned out.

"Isn't that Claire the Lune?" she asked when the third movement started.

"You know it?" I asked surprised. I hadn't expected her to like classical music. But then, I knew so little about her still. It was something I wanted very much to change.

"My mom used to play a lot of classical music in our house. I don't recognize many pieces, but I always liked this one."

Another piece to the puzzle that was Bella. I wanted to ask her about her mom, or her family, or basically everything that had anything to do with her, but I held back. There would be time for that later. I hoped.

We reached her place in companionable silence. It was a good silence, one that had nothing of the strained non-communication that had been between us for the last few weeks.

I parked the car but remained seating. Happily I noticed that Bella also didn't make any move to leave the car. We just sat there, listened to the music, lost in our respective thoughts. Bella had closed her eyes and I allowed myself to watch her just breathe.

When the last movement ended, she heaved a deep sigh.

"That was beautiful," she sighed in a slow exhale.

"Thanks," I said.

He eyes shot open and she starred over at me. "Was that you playing?" she asked with awe.

I have no idea how she made the connection. For all she knew I could have commented on my music selection. After all it's not exactly common that somebody is listening to recordings of his own piano play while driving around in his car.

I felt myself blush, as I nodded.

"Wow." She still stared that me.

"It's nothing." I ducked my head. Receiving compliments always made me feel a little bit uncomfortable.

"That wasn't nothing," she protested. "I think that was … amazing."

I felt my ears start to burn.

Just so I had something to do, I pushed the button to eject the disk. I pulled the CD out and placed it in its case.

"Would you like to have a copy?" I asked, not daring to look at her. It was such a stupid move and I knew that she had to think I'm an idiot.

"I'd love to," she said, and only then I risked looking up. She smiled widely at me and it was one of the most beautiful sights I ever had the pleasure to see.

I was really proud of myself that my hands didn't shake when I handed the disk to her.

As much as I would have liked to sit together with her in my car until the end of time, I knew that it had to come to an end soon. I climbed out and quickly stepped around it to open her door before she could. Me walking her to the house entrance felt just right, so I did it. Patiently I waited for her to pull out her keys and unlock the door.

Before she stepped inside, she turned around one more time.

"I'll see you tomorrow then, at school," she said, making it sound like half a question.

"Tomorrow." I nodded.

I waited for her to move inside and only when she pulled the door shut, I turned and reluctantly started to walk back to the Volvo. I was only a few steps away from the house, when I heard the door opening again and I spun around.

"Bella?" I asked, suddenly feeling apprehensive. Was something wrong with her?

"I think you forgot something," she said with a smile, holding a key out to me.

"Huh?"

"How will your brother get into my truck without the key?" she pointed out to me.

Of course! She couldn't know that Emmett and Jasper, and for that matter Rosalie and Alice, wouldn't have had any problems with getting into her car and hot wiring it. Feeling like an idiot – not for the first time today – I returned to her and took the key from her hand.

"Thanks," I said.

"I have to thank you," she replied, smiling at me, "for driving me home, and also for the disk." She held the item in question up.

"No problem," I managed to say, before I forced myself to turn away once again and move back to my car.

It was time to get back to school, to my family and the fight that I knew awaited me there.


	10. Chapter 10

Today's update is braught to you from Sarasota / Florida.

Please review!

Really, I mean it!

* * *

Back at school I only had to wait for a few minutes before the final bell sounded and the students started to swarm the parking lot. My family took their time and I was sure Alice had already brought them up to speed on everything that had happened today by the time they finally showed up.

I wondered if she had seen beforehand what would take place today, and if she had, why she hadn't intervened? She only would have had to stop me from going to Biology and it would have been very likely that I wouldn't have lost my resolve to stay away from Bella. Or maybe she had seen it and had realized that I only had been waiting for an opportunity to break my promise, that it had been a lost cause from the very beginning.

Because, if I was honest with myself, I had known for days I wouldn't last much longer. I had been so miserable for the last couple of weeks something simply had to give eventually. I now felt like a huge weight had been lifted off my shoulders and just the thought of being friends again with Bella filled me with such happiness I thought I should be floating. Even the prospect of my family's disappointment wasn't enough to purge that happy feeling.

The parking lot was almost empty, a short line of cars forming at the exit, when my family finally made their appearance.

Glancing over to them, I tried to gauge their reaction. Were they angry at me? Or disappointed? Did they hate me for what I had done?

What I saw, though, confused me. They were smiling.

First Alice danced over to me. Taking one look at me, she wrapped her arms around my middle, placing her head against my chest. Surprised I closed my arms around her, pulling her close to me.

I wasn't the huggy type, really, but sensing the silent support she was giving me, I couldn't help to feel grateful to her.

"I'm sorry," I began, addressing the others over her head, but Rosalie held up her hand, stopping my apology.

"It's us who are sorry, Edward. I think we made a big mistake forcing you to do something you clearly didn't want to do. We all have seen how unhappy you've been for the last couple of weeks. We should have stopped this sooner and found another way to protect Bella."

My mouth fell open and I stared at her, incapable to utter a single word.

"Let's go home," she said and I nodded mutely.

Alice had released me and Rosalie gave me a brief, half-hug before climbing into my car. Emmett slapped my back – gently for him, but still I staggered – then followed his wife.

Jasper held out his hand and I dropped Bella's car keys into it. "I'll catch up with you at the house," he said, before turning his steps towards Bella's truck. I knew I wouldn't need to give him directions. He would know where she lived.

A million questions ran through my head on the way home, but not one solidified enough to be formed into words. I just felt happy that my family had taken this so much better than I had any right to expect. I thought I would have to fight them over my decision, something that I hadn't been looking forward to.

Jasper waited for us at the garage. I couldn't help casting a glance at him. I knew if Alice had seen anything that would have caused Jasper to attack Bella she wouldn't have allowed her husband to get anyway near her. His eyes glowed in their usual topaz light, though, and when he saw me looking a small smile played around his lips. I guess he knew what I was thinking. He certainly felt my apprehension.

Entering the house I saw Carlisle, who had the afternoon off today, and Esme already waiting for us. Alice had probably called them, for I could see they already knew what I had done. I avoided their eyes, not sure on how they would take the news, but I didn't need to worry. They smiled as Esme placed an arm around my shoulder and led me to the dinning room table.

The setup reminded me very much of the fateful meeting five weeks ago, but the atmosphere was totally different. While back then the outcome had been so negative, today I felt hope permeate me. Last time I had decided to accept my fate and hide, now I was ready to face it head on and fight for the support of my family.

"Edward, please tell us what happened today," Carlisle turned to me, a smile on his lips. He looked relaxed for the first time in quite a while. I hadn't exactly noticed before, as I had been in my own little world of misery, but I hadn't really seen anybody in my family smile in the last couple of weeks.

I quickly reiterated the events from today, how Bella had almost fainted in Biology and as I had been incapable to stand by and do nothing. I told them how I got her to the nurse and how I drove her home afterwards. I tried to stay with the facts, but I couldn't help to smile once in a while at the memories, on how she had looked at me, at how happy it had made me feel.

"I know I should have tried harder," I finally admitted, my voice rough. "I should have stayed away from her to protect her, but I can't do that anymore. I just can't."

I didn't cry, though I was close. Rosalie quickly rose from her chair and came over to me. Without a word, she placed her arms around me. I allowed myself to sink into her embrace, letting her presence calm me, like it had done so many times when I had been younger.

"I'm sorry," I whispered.

She took a step back, placed two fingers under my chin and forced me to look into her golden eyes.

"I told you, Edward, we should have ended this much earlier. The last couple of weeks, they were terrible for you and, in extension, for us. Seeing you every day, watching how your spirit withered away, I don't think you have any idea how this affected us. I believe, no, actually I now know, we underestimated your feelings for Bella. It was a mistake and we are the ones who are sorry."

She gently stroked a feather-light finger along my jaw.

"I think we have to accept she's going to be an important part of your life. And if she's going to be part of your life, then she will be part of ours as well. We know you love her."

'You love her'

In the end it was a very simple statement.

I loved Bella.

As I mulled over those three words, I knew they were true. They had been true for a long time already and I had known that.

I did love Bella. I had no idea if she loved, or even liked me in return, and after how I had treated her the last weeks I wouldn't be surprised if she didn't want to have anything to do with me. But I had been given a second chance to find out how she felt about me, and I fully intended on using that chance.

Rosalie had returned to her seat and now cast a questioning look at Alice. She wanted to know how my decision had changed the future and so did I.

Alice looked apprehensive and I felt my heart skip a beat. "Edward, you know that what I see doesn't have to come true. The future is fluid and even a simple decision by somebody can change how something will come out."

I nodded, urging her to continue. I knew that stuff, I'd been around Alice long enough.

"For the last few weeks, I've taken several looks into Bella's future. And every single time the future I saw was different from the one I saw before. I've never met somebody who's future was so much in flux."

"I don't understand," I interrupted her. "Last time you spoke of her future, you said if I stayed with her there would be no doubt one of you would kill her." I looked around, smiling apologetically at my family. "Now you tell me her future is not written yet. How can that be?"

Alice sighed. "I don't know. I know it doesn't make sense. I'm sorry."

"Okay," I inhaled deeply trying to calm my nerves. "Just tell me, is one of you going to lose control and kill her?"

That was the question, really. That had been the reason I had forced myself to stay away for so long. If Alice said yes, if she saw one of my family doing what she had told me weeks before, I just didn't know what to do.

"I … don't think so," she slowly said, unsure.

"What do you mean?" I probed anxiously. I needed to know exactly what Alice saw.

"It's not clear, not in the long run. In one of my visions I see her getting killed, and I see a vampire being involved, but I don't think it will be one of us. It is only one vision, though, and it's much less likely than it was before."

"But it wasn't one of you?" I asked, needing confirmation.

She thought for another minute, then shook her head. "No, it won't be one of us."

"I have an idea about that," Jasper spoke up.

I tilted my head, my attention now fully on him.

"You know what we said the last time, how Bella's scent affects us?"

I simply nodded. As if I could forget?

"She still does affect us like that, but now other factors come into play. You care about Bella very much. We care about you. The thing is, up until now, we didn't know how deep your feelings for her were. If any of us would do something to hurt her, you would be hurt as well. Do you really think now any one of us could live with that knowledge? I believe, if nothing else, this is enough to stop us."

I looked at the people who had been my family as long as I could remember. Everybody smiled at me and nodded.

I felt myself smile in return. "Thanks, guys," I simply said. It was all I was capable of saying.

Alice placed a hand on Jasper's forearm, squeezing it gently. For a moment they got lost into each other's eyes and the love they felt for each other washed over us, making us all smile. The moment stretched on for a long time, and it was with a visible effort the two pulled away from each other.

"Edward, I think Jasper has it right." Alice now turned to me. "But even if Bella is safe from us, she still is in danger of some sorts. There is this unknown vampire I see and there are other dangers. I wish I could be more specific in what kind of danger she is, but I can't."

"Can we protect her then?" Emmett spoke up.

I looked over to my father, surprised. I hadn't expected him to support me like this. He grinned at me and an expecting glint showed in his eyes.

"I think so," Alice said, a smile suddenly on her face. "It will be a challenge, though."

"Oh, I do love challenges," Emmett retorted, and I suddenly knew why he offered his help. Part of it was, of course, because of me. I knew he wanted to protect me, and he knew that I cared about Bella, so he would naturally also protect her. But the other part was that this sounded like a challenge to him, and if there's something Emmett really enjoyed it was that.

"Thanks," I said sincerely.

"Think nothing of it," Emmett dismissed my thanks with a wave of his hand, but I knew he was pleased.

We then went down to do some serious planning, going through various options and possibilities. Especially this other vampire Alice had seen caused us some concern. With her scent Bella was just too damn alluring for her own good. We developed plans what to do, if this unknown vampire should ever show up here, though we hoped we never would need to execute them.

After two hours the ideas dwindled down and eventually we decided to take a break. I was exhausted and hungry and stumbled more than walked into the kitchen to make myself a sandwich and something to drink. I was sitting at the kitchen counter devouring my food when Emmett sat down next to me.

"You're okay, kid?" he asked quietly.

I nodded, my mouth too full to speak. I was feeling good, much, much better than I had felt for the last couple of weeks. I had hope again and knowing that my family was behind me made me fell warm and cared for.

"It's just, well…," he stammered breaking off in the middle of the sentence, and I looked up at him in surprise.

My father was not one to mince words. If he wanted to say something, he did so, straight forward and damn the consequences. It had gotten him into plenty of trouble with Rosalie, leading to some spectacular fights. Of course, they always made up in the end – they did love each other too much for that.

I looked at him questioningly, hoping he finally would spill what was on his mind.

"Well, I just wanted to say I'm sorry for hurting you. I knew you were suffering, and I should have seen that there had to be another way," he finally rushed out.

I raised an eyebrow – a skill I was particularly proud to have mastered – and reached for my glass to wash the sandwich down.

"You had the best interest of the family in mind, dad. And Bella's too. Do you think I wanted her to get hurt?"

"That's it," he said. "You're family. You're my son. Don't you think you're less important because you're not a vamp. Actually, you're more important to me because of it."

I almost blushed at that statement. Instead I took another bite.

"I've been thinking, though. I tried to put myself in your shoes and imagening it would be Rosie instead of Bella. I know I would never have lasted as long as you did. Not because I think you love Bella less than I love your mother. But because I almost think you do love her more."

My eyes grew wide and I forgot to chew.

My dad looked quickly away and rose from his seat.

"I just wanted you to know what I'm thinking," he finally said, quickly leaving the kitchen.

I sat for a little while longer, the sandwich almost forgotten. In the end I finished it off, smiled to myself and went up to my room.

For the first time in weeks I didn't need any pills to go to sleep and instead of nightmares I only dreamed of good things.

I dreamed of Bella.


	11. Chapter 11

The next morning I woke refreshed and couldn't wait to get to school. We arrived early and I waited in the parking lot for Bella to show up while my family went ahead to the school buildings.

Finally Bella pulled up and I walked over to her car, opening the door for her before she could. She looked up when the door opened, still busy with unfastening the seat belt and reaching for her things on the passenger seat. When she saw it was me her eyes widened in surprise and something akin to shock.

"Good morning, Bella," I greeted her with a smile and held my hand out to take her bag.

"Edward, you don't need to do this," she said, looking at my hand. She pulled the bag over her own shoulder and climbed out of the car. The bag looked heavy and I wondered what the heck she was bringing with her to school.

"I know, but I would love to," I replied grinning widely, as I still held out my hand.

She considered for one a moment, then handed the bag over without a word. It weighed a ton.

"Wow, what do you bring to school? Bricks?"

She had to laugh at that, and, God, did I love that sound.

"Nah," she shook her head. "I had to borrow a couple of books from the school library and want to return them today."

We started to walk toward the entrance of the school. Some of the other kids who were still arriving cast us curious glances but I didn't care. I was just too happy to be with Bella. She, on the other hand, started to blush when she noticed the looks we got.

"This is ridiculous," she muttered, staring at two girls who were openly pointing at us.

Instantly my good mood evaporated. I had noticed before that Bella hated all kinds of attention, and being with me all of a sudden after I had ignored her for weeks - which certainly hadn't gone unnoticed by the majority of the school's student body - would cause just that: attention.

"I'm sorry," I said, glowering at the two girls, who instantly looked away, hiding their faces.

"It's not your fault," she said.

I wasn't so sure about that. Well, actually, I knew it was my fault because of the way I had treated her before. At least she didn't demand her bag back, so I guess she wasn't too annoyed. At least I hoped she wasn't

More students stared at us, but I tried to ignore them. I was watching Bella instead, which was, in my book, a much more interesting pastime. She had her eyes cast down and was nervously biting her lower lip, but once in a while she looked at me from underneath her long eye lashes and smiled a little and every time I thought my heart would stop.

We reached her locker and she held her hand out for her bag, which I reluctantly returned to her. I leaned against a locker nearby as I watched her pulling out several books and placing them inside.

She would have to leave for her class soon, so I gathered up all my courage.

"Would you want to join me for lunch today?" I asked, rushing the words out, making them almost into one single word.

"What?" She nearly dropped her bag, but I managed to catch it before it reached the ground.

Damn, I shouldn't have pushed her like that. I was moving too fast. But then, I had lost so much time already and I wanted to talk to her.

"I'm sorry," I said for the second time today and handed the now much lighter bag back to her. "I know you usually sit with your friends and ..."

She held up her hand palm outward, stopping me mid-sentence.

"It's okay," she said, almost too low for me to hear. "I'd love to sit with you at lunch." She smiled shyly at me.

I spent the rest of the morning in a bit of a daze and I knew I was incapable of wiping that stupid grin I had off my face. Alice, who was in Government with me, gave me a thumbs-up sign and winked at me. I guess - well, hoped - this meant my lunch date with Bella would go well.

Bolstered with that little bit of intel, I waited at the end of forth period at the door of Bella's classroom. Again I got curious glances from my fellow students, but I ignored them, only interested in one person in that room.

When Bella saw me she looked surprised, almost as if she hadn't expected me to show up. I wasn't sure why she should think something like that, but then I remembered how I had treated her the last weeks, and realized that it would be a while before she would be able to trust me. Not that I could blame her for that. It had been my fault after all.

She was talking to Angela, one of the girls she usually hung out with. "See you tomorrow," Bella said to her before turning to me.

"Okay," the other girl replied, then smiled shortly at me before she walked down the corridor towards the cafeteria. I always had liked Angela and again I was reminded why. Unlike most other students she simply accepted a given situation without judging.

"Hi Bella," I said, pushing myself off the wall.

"I wasn't sure you would be here," she said, smiling shyly up to me.

"I asked you if you'd be okay with this," I reminded her gently. "I just hope you haven't changed your mind." As she had every right to do.

"No," she shook her head. "I haven't changed my mind."

"Good to hear." Once again I offered to take her bag, but this time she declined.

After she stowed her bag in her locker, we made our way to the cafeteria. We picked up some food, then searched for an empty table for us. My family was sitting at their usual table. I felt a little bit self-conscious as I knew they would be able to hear every word we said. I glanced over to them. Rosalie was watching me. When Emmett saw me looking at her, he winked at me from across the room and whispered something into her ear. She turned to him and gave him a kiss and I knew we would be alone, at least for now.

"You know, it's funny," Bella said. She had noticed where I had been looking and was now also watching my family. "I've never seen your family eat anything."

My head whipped around and I stared at her.

"What?" I hadn't been ready for that.

"You know, every time I see you and your brothers and sisters here, you're the only one to actually eat."

_That's because they're vampires and live off animal blood._ Shit, I couldn't just come out and tell her that. Certainly not here and not now.

"Ehr, they don't like the food here very much," I said, trying to act nonchalant. Well, it was the truth after all.

"You don't seem to have any problems with it," she said, pointing at the food I had on my tray.

After five weeks of barely eating anything because I simply had lacked the appetite, my hunger had returned with a vengeance. A large portion of today's pasta special, a slice of pizza and a plate piled with salad crowded my tray, so my pint of milk and the apple I also had picked barely found room on it.

I simply shrugged, picked up my fork and then dug in. "What can I say," I said around a mouthful of the pasta. "I'm not very picky where food is concerned."

"You could say that again," she grinned at me and also started with her food.

"I'm not very picky where food is concerned," I said again, grinning.

For a second she froze, hardly believing I had actually the audacity to go through with that god awful pun. Then she laughed out loud.

"That was awful," she said, once she had herself back under control.

I raised an eyebrow, but nodded. "I know. Sorry." But I couldn't stop myself from grinning. It was so great to see her laugh.

"So, are you looking forward to your trip to the beach tomorrow?" I changed the topic.

She nodded, though without too much enthusiasm. "I've been there a couple of times when I was a kid. It will be nice to see it again. Have you've been there before?"

I shook my head. As my family had been banned from Quileute land, I never had the opportunity to go there.

"Who else is coming?"

Mike Newton had mentioned others when he had talked to Bella the day before. I was sort of glad about it, as I didn't like the thought of Mike being alone with Bella. Sometimes he looked at her in a way I didn't really care about.

"Some others from our year. Angela, Jessica, Eric, Tyler and Ben, I think. A few more I'm not exactly sure who else."

Good. That looked like a big enough and thus safe group.

"I really wish I could come, too," I said with a little sigh. I really would love to spend more time with her. But I just couldn't shirk my duties. It would be wrong.

"Me too," she said softly, looking up at me from underneath her long eye lashes, and I almost changed my mind about the work at the hospital.

"You'll have fun," I assured her, trying to sound more cheery than I really felt. "I believe the weather will clear up and there will actually be some sunshine this weekend."

Alice had already confirmed this. In fact, there would be a couple of nice and sunny days until Tuesday. This was actually a bit of a problem, as my family wouldn't be able to come to school on those days. It simply would be too conspicuous for them to walk across the campus in the sunshine. Normally I would skip school as well, taking the 'Cullens go Camping on Sunny Days' excuse, which we had always used in the past. As our grades were good enough, we never had any problems to get out of school. This time, however, I would stay in school, keeping an eye on Bella.

"You mean there are actually days with sunshine here in Forks?" she asked half mockingly.

"Yeah, I know, it's a shock. But I've seen it happen," I joked right back, enjoying how relaxed she now acted.

"They should close the school then and declare a national holiday."

"I agree. And they should have a parade on main street."

We tossed back and forth a few more ideas on the 'Forks Sunny Holiday' day, each one more outrageous than the one before. Bella's nearness and the sight of her laughing made me act far sillier than I usually would. In the end, we both were laughing so hard we couldn't get any more words out, and tears were streaming down our faces.

I don't think I ever had so much fun. And having this fun together with Bella simply made it perfect.

We were still laughing when the bell to the next period rang. Quickly, we dumped our trash and walked together to our Biology class room. Inside we slipped into our seats, waiting for Mr. Banner to arrive.

"Do you have a moment after class is over?" I whispered to Bella, just as our teacher entered the class room. I wanted to ask her something.

She simply nodded.

Banner called the class to order and started with his lecture for the day. Today there wasn't any team work as Banner went on to explain the historical background on the different blood types and how the whole blood typing thing actually worked. Nothing new for me there – living with vampires had led me to know more about blood than Banner would probably ever know – so I could fill the lesson with my new favorite thing to do: watching Bella.

Naturally she noticed me staring at her. Every time she did, she usually just smiled a little before looking back to the front of the class. I took this as a very good sign. Sometimes, though, she frowned, which seriously confused me. I really wished I would be able to read her mind, know what she was thinking. I always thought I was good at reading people, but with Bella I felt lost. Or maybe, for the first time, it really was important to me what somebody thought. I didn't want to make any mistakes with Bella and because of this I couldn't decide on what any given gesture and glance meant.

Eventually, finally, the hour drew to an end and Banner dismissed us. I stayed behind with Bella, waiting for her to place her books in her bag. She took her time, lingering until the last of the students had left the room and we were finally alone.

She sat back on her chair, looking at me expectantly.

"What do you want?"

I took a deep breath, trying to calm myself. Suddenly I felt very nervous.

"I've heard that you're not going to the spring ball weekend after next," I started.

The spring ball had been the most talked about event this week. I knew Bella hadn't asked anybody, stating she had other plans for the day. Now I was hoping I might be able to include myself in those other plans of her.

She looked at me, her eyes suddenly narrow. "You're not going to ask me, too?"

"What?"

"In the last week, Mike, Eric and Tyler have asked me if I wanted to go with them to the ball. I thought it was a girl's choice ball and all, and I have other plans anyway, so what the heck is the matter with them?" She ranted on, clearly annoyed at the boys in question.

Not that I could really blame them. I could very much understand why they had asked her, for Bella was a wonderful person and who wouldn't want to spend time with her? The fact that she had rejected them also gave me a warm feeling. It meant she wasn't especially interested in any of them, which hopefully increased my chances.

I suppressed a grin and asked, "I was just wondering what your plans for that day were."

She relaxed a little. "I need to go to Seattle to get some things. Books mostly - the selection here is a bit lacking. Why do you ask?"

"I was wondering if you wanted a ride," I offered.

She stared at my blankly. "What?"

"Well, I need to go to Seattle anyway some time soon, and so I thought I could give you a ride."

"I thought you're at the hospital on Saturdays."

"Only every other Saturday. I'm free the one after tomorrow."

"Why would you take me?"

I shouldn't be surprised at the shock in her voice. I had treated her pretty badly the last couple of weeks and it had been less than 24 hours since I started talking to her again.

Still, it hurt.

"As I said, I need to go anyway. And honestly, I don't think your truck is going to make it."

"My truck works just fine," she defended that piece of junk she called a car.

"What kind of mileage has that thing anyway?" I asked. "Don't tell me you can make it to Seattle with just one tank of gas."

"That's what gas stations are for," she replied to that slur of her car, though I thought I could feel her resolve weakening.

"Think of the environment," I added now. "The emission values of my car are ten times better than yours."

I got her there.

"Besides," I raised the pressure a bit more. "If I drive, you'll spend less time on the drive back and forth, and you can spend more time on whatever you want to do in Seattle."

Finally she sighed, then nodded. "Okay, if you insist, I'm coming with you."

She sounded as if she just had said yes to her own execution. But when I looked at her sideways, I noticed the corner of her mouth twitching as she tried to suppress a grin.

I grinned at her, probably looking like an idiot. A very happy idiot.

She had said yes!


	12. Chapter 12

I'm back from my vacation, so, hopefully, the updates will be a bit more regularly from now on.

* * *

The weekend seemed to speed by and, strangely enough, at the same moment time seemed to crawl at an agonizing slowness I didn't remember ever experiencing.

Saturday morning I followed Carlisle around at the hospital as usual as he made his rounds. But my thoughts were mostly on Bella, what she was doing right now, where she was. I really hoped she was alright. I had noticed before that she tended to stumble and fall easily – I had heard a few horror stories about her from Gym – and the thought of her on a rocky beach with a million things to fall over made me feel a bit anxious. I just had to hope she didn't fall into the ocean or break a leg while trying to climb a rock, or something similar to this.

At least, if something should happen to her, and she would need to be brought to the hospital I would find out about it fairly quickly.

In the afternoon I went to see Mrs. Jackson again. Her condition had taken a turn to the worse and I knew her days were numbered. She was now on some heavy pain medications to ease her passing and she spent a lot of her time sleeping, but she was awake when I came in.

"Hello, Mrs. Jackson," I greeted her as I entered her room. I went over to her bed.

"Edward?" she asked, sounding a little confused. Her tired eyes were searching my face.

I smiled for her, even though it pained me to see her in this condition. The last few times I had been here, I had been fairly miserable myself and I don't think my visits had helped her like they should. I hoped to be able to cheer her up a little bit better this time.

"Yes, it's me."

She looked at me for a long time, then a small smile formed on her lips.

"So, how is your lovely Bella today?" she asked. Even though her voice sounded weak, I could hear how pleased she was.

I should have known that Mrs. Jackson would instantly pick up on my much improved mood compared to the last few times I'd been here. It had been visible to everybody else I had met today. I should also have known that she would make the connection that this change in my mood was due to Bella. She had asked me about her every time I'd been here, but as I hadn't wanted to talk about her, I never had answered this question.

"She is doing fine," I said, confirming her conclusion. "We are friends."

If not for the IV drip to the back of her hand, I was sure she would have clapped her hands excitedly like a little girl.

"Tell me everything."

I proceeded to tell her of how Bella had nearly fainted in class the other day and how I had brought her to the nurse's station. I, of course, didn't mention why I had stayed away from her to begin with and what my family's reaction had been, but other than than I was pretty honest to her. She listened intently to everything I said.

"And next Saturday we're going to drive together to Seattle," I concluded my story.

"Edward, I never understood why you did this to yourself. This Bella of yours, she sounds like a really nice girl and I know you're crazy about her. These last couple of weeks, they had been simply wrong. If you ever do something as stupid as this again, I'm going to find a way to haunt you as a ghost, if that's the only way to beat any sense into your thick skull."

I knew she would.

"Thank you," I said sincerely.

"So, what are you planning for this trip to Seattle?" she now asked.

I actually hadn't thought about it so far. I had been too happy she had agreed, I hadn't started any planning. I was sure Bella had her own plans; that's why she had wanted to get to Seattle to begin with. She had mentioned books and I wouldn't mind driving her to every book store in town and watch her pick out what she was looking for. I was pretty sure I would enjoy it. And of course there was the drive itself. It was a three and a half hour ride one way, and that meant I would be spending seven hours in total with her in the car. There would be plenty of time to talk, to learn everything I wanted about her.

"Bella mentioned she wanted to look for some books," I explained to Mrs. Jackson.

The old lady looked like she was about to roll her eyes.

"Edward, what am I going to do with you?" she asked rhetorically. "Here's your chance to make right for that girl and all you want to do is to get her to do some book shopping."

I was about to ask her what else I could do. After all, it was Bella who wanted to look at books. But she held up her hand and stopped me before I could say a word.

"Listen, Edward, I know you like her, and I would think she likes you too, so what you need to do is take her out to lunch to a nice place, show her that you care about her. Nothing too fancy, though, you don't want to scare her away, right?"

That I most certainly didn't want to do. I nodded.

"All right, then. I'm going to let you in on a little secret. Women do like attention, but we don't like to be smothered with it. Ask her what she wants to do, offer her some options and then accept her choice."

I nodded again. I already had figured out that much. I knew what I wanted, which was to spend as much time as possible with Bella, but I also knew I needed to give her space to decide for herself if she wanted to spend time with me. I didn't want to scare her away.

Of course, once she found out my family is made up mostly of vampires, she would be plenty scared. Who in his right mind wouldn't be? Even though they were vegetarians, as they liked to call themselves, it was a fact that they all could be extremely dangerous.

Mrs. Jackson grew tired and she asked me to read something to her. I picked up a book from her night stand and for the next ten minutes I read to her until she fell asleep.

Though it had been sunny in the morning, the clouds had pulled in during the day and Carlisle and I drove home through the rain in silence. My thoughts were again on Bella and what she was doing right now. Was she still at the beach, caught in the rain? Or was she already back home, safe and sound and dry? At least she hadn't shown up at the hospital, so it was reasonable to assume she had managed not to injure herself seriously. I missed her, though.

I had known I was attracted to her from the moment I had first seen her. I still wasn't sure what it was that drew me to her like this. At first I just thought her to be merely pretty, but later I realized that in fact she was beautiful. I had found that I could easily talk to her. She wasn't, or rather tried not to be, a damsel in distress. She could stand her ground – that was when she didn't trip over it. I wanted to protect her. We did share the love for classical music.

There were many little things and all added to one, undeniable fact.

I was in love with her.

I had stayed away in order to save her, but that hadn't worked out so well. Now I would stay close to her to protect her in any way I could.

Because I simply couldn't image a life without her in it any longer.

At home I found my way to the grand piano in the living room. I was the only one really playing it regularly, though Esme did so once in a while, but nobody had really touched it for the last couple of weeks. I opened the lid for the keys and tested the quality of the instrument by playing a short melody I had memorized for just that purpose. It was just a little bit out of tune, due to the long time of neglect, but acceptable for now. I would need to ask Esme if she could help me with tuning it again later.

I stretched my fingers and started to play.

I had learned to play the piano when I had been very small. We always had an instrument in the house and I sort of remember watching Esme with awe whenever she was playing. Soon I was sitting on her lap, hitting the keys with my stubby fingers, surprised and pleased that every time I did hit a different key I would get a different sound. First Esme had taught me, but later I had also gone to a couple of professional teachers, who all accorded me some real talent. I did perform in various school concerts and for a while I was torn between my wish to become a professional concert pianist or to become a doctor. In the end the desire to heal people turned out to be the bigger one, and so I only ever played for myself and my family any more. The CD I had given Bella had been a recording I originally had made with the help of Alice and Jasper for Esme for Christmas last year.

First I played some of my favorites: Bach, Beethoven, Chopin and eventually Debussy. Playing Claire the Lune naturally brought my thoughts back to Bella, and when I was finished, I moved over to a melody I had had in my head for a little while now. Soft and gentle, it reminded me of her and even though it was unfinished still, I thought it fitted her somehow. I played around with some variations, changing tempo and pitch, but didn't quite get what I wanted. Maybe this was as it should be, for I still didn't quite know where I was standing with her, and was still searching my way to her.

When I looked up I saw Carlisle and Esme standing in the opening between the living room and the kitchen. Carlisle had his arms wrapped around his wife, resting his chin on the top of her head. He had a content expression on his face and when he saw me looking at him, he smiled at me. I had no idea how long they had been standing there, but I had the feeling it had been a while.

"This was very beautiful, Edward," Esme said as she disengaged herself from Carlisle's arms and came over to sit next to me on the bench.

"It's not quite finished yet," I admitted. My fingers rested on the keys, but I didn't put any pressure on them. For now, I would let the melody go. I knew in time I would be able to work out what my problem with it is.

"Is this for Bella?" she asked softly.

I nodded.

"It had been a mistake of us to have you stay away from her. You two, you are meant to be together. If I had had any doubts about it, this here would have taken them away. It has been far too long since you have played. I have missed it."

"You all wanted her to be safe and that's what I want, too," I reminded her. It had been a decision by everybody and I had been willing to try to live with it. That was, until it had become too much for me.

"We should have found another way right from the beginning," she said.

"It's okay." I didn't really want to talk about it any more. What was done was done, and now I had a second chance with Bella and it was up to me to use that chance. I knew my family was a hundred percent behind me and that meant a lot to me.

So I went back to playing, a lively piece for four hands and the moment Esme picked up what I was doing, she joined me.


	13. Chapter 13

My family was leaving on Sunday for a three day hunting trip. Alice's weather forecast meant they wouldn't be able to go to school or work as usual. Emmett was looking forward to get some bears, so they planned to go to the Goat Rock Wilderness. It had a reported bear problem and my family was more than happy to help out with that. Normally, I would have gone with them, holding the camp and helping with the illusion that they were just normal campers, but not this time. I wanted to stay behind, hoping for a chance to spend some time with Bella.

Alice had taken a look into the future and assured me there would be no danger to Bella while they were gone. She still promised me she would take a look occasionally, and to call me immediately the moment she saw anything change.

They left in the morning, taking Emmett's jeep and Carlisle's Mercedes. I had some homework left to do, so I took the breakfast Esme had prepared for me and settled in the living room for some serious reading. Even though the report was only due on Wednesday, I wanted to be done early. Maybe there was a chance Bella would be available on Monday or Tuesday and it would be a shame really if she should want to see me and I had no time for her. Though, if in doubt, I would rather let that stupid report go first.

I managed to cram in a couple of hours, making good progress. Around lunch time, I started to lose my concentration. Not for the first time my thoughts drifted to Bella. What was she doing right now? Was she at home? Or had she gone out with some friends? How had her trip to LaPush been?

I was out of the house before I really was aware what I was doing. Esme had left me plenty of food in the fridge and I knew how to operate the microwave, but suddenly I felt the urge to have some take-out. Chinese sounded just perfect. And if I was driving to town anyway, I might as well swing by Bella's place and see if she was home.

Yeah, right, that was it.

Who was I fooling?

The faded red monstrosity Bella called a truck was parked outside of her house, but her father's police cruiser was nowhere in sight. I didn't know if Chief Swan worked on Sundays or if he was out doing whatever police officers did in their free time. Maybe he was just out grocery shopping and would be back any minute.

I parked my car on the other side of the street, hoping to catch a glimpse of Bella, but I didn't have any luck. A hundred times I was thinking about getting out of the car and walk over to the house, but a hundred times I decided against it. What was I to say to Bella anyway? _I was just in the area and wanted to see if you're still alive._ Or, _I just couldn't live any longer without seeing you again._ Yeah, that would go over so well. She would think I was a creepy stalker.

I placed my forehead against the steering wheel when realization hit me: I really was a creepy stalker.

This was getting pathetic.

With a sigh I restarted the car and drove back home, only to realize as I walked through the door that I had forgotten to get the Chinese food, which had been my excuse to get out of the house.

I changed clothes and went on a long run to clear my head.

I had a restless night. My dreams were once again filled with Bella. I knew she was in some kind of danger, but try as I might I couldn't manage to get to close to her. She called my name, but I couldn't find her. I was running and running and running, but never could reach her.

I awoke to sunlight streaming through my window. I took a quick shower, grabbed something for breakfast and was on my way to school early. I was eager to see Bella again and hoped to catch her outside before class started.

I was in luck. Her truck was already in the parking lot and I saw her sitting on one of the benches in the rarely used picnic area just off the parking lot. She was sitting with her back to the table, her face pointed towards the sun, her eyes closed as she was soaking up the rays.

My breath caught. Her long hair was tumbling over her shoulders, the sun giving it red highlights. Her light, perfect skin fairly glowed. Her full lips were slightly parted, soft and inviting and I wondered how they would feel against mine. From there, my mind took a turn to what else I would like to do with my lips and her skin and I felt a sudden warmth and tightness in my pants.

I closed my eyes, took a deep breath, then swallowed and exhaled. So far I hadn't allowed myself to entertain thoughts of kissing Bella. I knew it was too soon. I didn't know if she wanted to be kissed and I would never do something to her she didn't want. But the way she looked right now…

God!

"Edward?"

My eyes flew open. Bella was looking at me with a puzzled expression. I could only imagine what she was thinking with me standing there with closed eyes, looking like an idiot.

I forced my face into a smile, hoping she didn't realize what I had been thinking about.

"Good morning, Bella."

She smiled at me and I quickly sat down next to her.

"It's a beautiful day," she said.

I nodded. "How was your weekend?" I wanted to know everything that had happened while she had been away from me.

She thought for a moment. "Interesting," she then said.

Interesting? What was that supposed to mean?

"Interesting how?" I asked, twisting my body so I could watch her better.

"I heard some interesting stories," she said.

"What kind of stories?"

"Mostly legends. Some of the kids from the reservation showed up in the afternoon and we got talking."

My eyes widened. The Quileute knew about my family's secret, but they were bound by the treaty not to reveal it to anybody outside of the tribe. If they now started to tell everybody who came by that my family were all vampires, this could be really bad. If bad came to worse, we would have to leave here, and that was something I really, really didn't want right now.

"What kind of legends?" I asked from behind gritted teeth. My right hand clenched into a fist, the knuckles standing out white. I needed to know exactly what she had heard – what the others had heard.

Bella looked at me strangely and I forced my body to relax, opening my hand one finger at a time. She couldn't know how desperately I needed to hear what she had learned.

"I'm sort of interested in local legends," I explained, not exactly lying.

"There was this one boy from the reservation. We took a walk along the beach and he told me a legend of his people, how they descended from wolves and also of some others they called the Cold Ones. It was really fascinating."

Bella was watching me intensely now, trying to gauge my reaction. Remotely I noted that she had said she had been walking along the beach with somebody from the reservation and the by now familiar jealousy made itself known. But she had spoken of the boy in singular and it also sounded as if nobody else had been around to hear the story. Maybe this wasn't quite as bad as I feared. And maybe she hadn't made a connection between the legendary Cold Ones and the Cullens.

But then, why should she bring it up in front of me in the first place? No, I was sure this unknown boy had mentioned something about my family and Bella now tried to find out what was true about what she had heard. Well, how did the saying go? The best defense is a good offense.

"I heard that one, too," I quickly said. "Those Cold Ones are scary. Aren't they the ones who drink blood?" I laughed at that, as if I wasn't taking the story seriously.

She nodded, blushed and looked away from me. Damn, had I overdone it? I wanted to make light of the legends – which I knew after all were based on facts – but I didn't want to embarrass her into thinking I believed she was childish for taking some stock into them.

The bell for the first period rang and Bella jumped up from the bench. She reached for her bag, but somehow managed to whip it off the table it had been resting on. It split open, scattering all the books on the ground.

"Not again!" she moaned under her breath.

I got up quickly and gathered her books together. I handed her the ones I'd picked up and she shoved them back into her bag, with more force than necessary. Before she could do more damage to it, I took it out of her hand.

"How about I accompany you to your first period?" I offered.

For a moment she glared at me, but then her features softened and she nodded.

"Thanks. I don't know why, but I'm a terrible klutz."

"You are not terrible. Nothing about you could ever be terrible," I said, smiling. If ever, she was terribly adorable, but of course this would be the wrong thing to tell her. I was pretty sure she wouldn't take it well.

She looked up at me and for a moment she froze, as if forgetting how to breathe.

"Class," I reminded her and she pulled herself out of her daze.

She turned on her heels and almost fell on her first step. I caught her in time, so no harm done, but if possible her blush deepened.

"Could I see you at lunch again?" I asked as we reached her class room and we had to separate.

She nodded. I handed her the bag and turned away in order to get to my own lessons.

Morning crawled along, but eventually it was lunch time. Once again I waited for her at the door of her class room.

In the cafeteria we got our food and then sat down at the same table we had sat last Friday. She looked around and her eyes fell on the empty table where my family usually sat during lunch.

"Where's your family?"

"Camping," I explained. "Carlisle, my dad, believes when the sun shines, we should get as much out of it as possible. He has a deal with the hospital, so whenever there are a couple of nice days he takes off and we all go someplace nice hiking. The hospital doesn't want to lose him, so they go along with it."

"But you're not with them," Bella stated the obvious.

"Yeah. I told him I'd rather stay here this time. He was cool with that."

I didn't tell her my real reason for staying behind.

A thoughtful expression crossed her face and she looked at me wearily. Was she guessing I stayed because of her? What was she thinking about it? Was she okay with it? Embarrassed? Happy?

"Your dad - Carlisle - he's not your real dad, right?" she then asked.

I wondered what had brought on this question, but I had no problem answering it.

"Nah. I've been adopted. We all have been at one point. Carlisle and Esme can't have children of their own." It was one of the very few drawbacks of being a vampire. But, as my presence in the family had shown, there were ways to get around that problem.

"What about your real parents?" She leaned closer, sounding as if she was really interested.

"I have no idea who they are. I was a foundling. My best guess is that I was the product of a teenage pregnancy and as soon as my mother had me, she dumped me."

Her hand flew to her mouth and she looked at me with wide eyes. "That's terrible."

I shrugged. It had been a long time ago and I had grown up in a family that loved me and cared for me more than my birth parents ever did. I had never really wanted to know who my mother was. It wouldn't change anything anyway.

"I got used to it. My family - my adopted family that is - I know they do love me, so I guess I really got lucky in the end."

I knew I did.

"What about you?" I now asked in return. If she could ask questions about me I thought it was only fair to get in a few questions of my own. "You used to live with your mom before, right? Why did you move here?"

"My mom and I used to live in Phoenix, but then she met another guy, Phil, and they married."

"And you didn't get along with Phil?" I hazarded a guess, though I sensed this wasn't quite it.

She shook her head. "Phil's okay. He makes my mom happy and that's all I can ask of him. He travels a lot, though. He plays ball for a living and my mom wanted to spend time with him."

"So she sent you here to your dad?"

Again I had guessed wrong.

"No, I sent myself."

I looked at her questioningly, trying to understand what she meant with that remark.

"How can I explain this?" She bit her lower lip as she tried to work out how to explain the situation to me. "At first my mom stayed with me, but she missed Phil terribly and it made her unhappy. So I decided it was time to spend some quality time with my dad."

"But you still miss Phoenix?"

She thought about that for a minute, then shrugged.

"I miss the sunshine and the warmth, and most of all I miss my mom. But Forks does have its perks. I love my dad and it's good for him to have somebody to take care of him, and I don't mind. I've made friends here. So I think it's not so bad all in all."

"I'm glad to hear that," I said. I was happy for her that she had found a place for herself here. And of course if she hadn't decided to move here, I would never have met her, and so, for a very selfish reason, I was very happy she had come.


	14. Chapter 14

After school the next day, Bella was going to Port Angeles with some of her friends. They were planning to look at dresses for the spring ball, and even though Bella wasn't going to the dance herself, she had agreed to help Jessica and Angela with picking out something for them. As this obviously was a girl's only trip, I didn't ask if I could join them. I had been forced to go shopping with Alice enough times to know that this wasn't something I would think of as fun, though I suspected the fact that Bella was involved in the whole proceeding would greatly increase my enjoyment of it. Everything involving Bella was of interest to me.

I thought briefly about staying home, waiting for my family's return, but then decided to drive to Port Angeles as well. Even though I didn't want to get in the way of the shopping experience, I thought I could 'accidently' arrange to bump into them after they were done. Maybe go to dinner with them and then convince Bella to take a ride home with me.

I arrived around four o'clock and parked my car in a public garage. I didn't want to sit there and wait until there was a good time to go in search of the girls, so I got out and walked down to the pier.

Port Angeles was the largest city on the Olympic Peninsular, and also held the headquarters of the Olympic National Park. This meant it saw much more tourism than Forks and the city planners had reacted by building a picturesque boardwalk by the bay. Small shops with all kinds of souvenirs lined the walk, with plenty of t-shirts, knickknacks, jewelry and food on display. It was still off season, so the place was pretty empty and I just browsed a little bit, not really looking for anything special.

I didn't see Bella or the others, but then I hadn't really expected it. My guess was they had gone to the only department store in town, which was a couple of blocks off the bay.

By five I thought about starting to go looking for them, but then decided to give them a little bit more time. I knew buying a dress could be a lengthy endeavor as all advantages and disadvantages of any single garment in the store needed to be considered and discussed carefully. At least that was the way Alice and Rosalie went shopping. That was, unless they knew exactly what they wanted. In that case, it was a matter of seconds to discover if or if not what they were looking for could be found in the store. It was a puzzle to me how women did that, but it was a fact that they did.

Eventually I had enough of looking through the shops. It wouldn't be long before the sun would set and I was anxious to find Bella. I turned away from the bay heading South.

"Edward?"

It was a female voice that called my name, but not the voice I had been hoping for.

"Hi Jessica, hi Angela," I greeted the two friends who were walking towards me, loaded with several shopping bags each. There was no sight of Bella.

"What are you doing here?" Jessica asked bluntly.

I pondered if I should tell them some lie why I was here, but then decided against it. The fact that Bella wasn't with them worried me and I needed to know where she had gone.

"I'm actually looking for Bella. She said she would be coming with you two today."

"She did," Jessica confirmed. "But then she said she wanted to go and look at that book store in Foster Street. If you want you can wait with us. We're going to meet her again at that Italian place on the boardwalk in an hour."

She sounded hopeful that I would say yes, but I shook my head. For some reason I had a bad feeling about this. Bella had a talent to get into trouble and her being alone in her strange town didn't sound good to me.

"I'll go and see if I can catch her at the book store. Maybe later then."

"Okay," she said with a speculative gleam in her eyes. I knew she was wondering if Bella and I were an item, and my behavior only enforced her suspicion. I didn't care, though. I was far too worried by now.

I moved past the two girls and walked quickly toward the little esoteric book store Jessica had mentioned. Arriving there, I saw through the store window that the place was empty except for an elderly woman who hadn't realized yet that being a hippie was a little bit out of style.

I stood in front of the place, wondering what to do next. I looked around in hope I might be able to catch a glimpse of Bella, when suddenly my phone rang. I pulled it out of my pocket and saw that it was Alice.

"Alice?" I asked breathlessly, a cold lump suddenly forming in my stomach. Alice had said she would call me if she saw something in Bella's future change.

Alice didn't waste any time with greetings. "Edward, you need to find Bella now. She's in serious danger."

Damn!

"Where is she? How much time do I have?"

"Not much time. She in some industrial area, warehouses maybe, South of you. There are four men."

I didn't wait for any more information. I started to run.

I didn't know Port Angeles that well, but remembered that as I had been driving downtown I had passed several warehouses on the way. This was where I was heading now.

As I ran I wondered what Bella was doing in the warehouse area. Had she somehow lost her way? Had she been brought there by somebody else? Who were the four men Alice had mentioned? What were their intentions?

Well, I could guess on the last one. Bella was a beautiful girl and alone - sometimes that was all it took.

Anger rose in me, lending strength to my legs. At each intersection I paused for a short moment, checking left and right if I could see her, before running on.

Eventually, I found myself at a T-intersection. In front of me was a chain-linked fence with barbed wire on top, to both sides a street with several warehouses with loading docks. It was getting dark.

Left of right? Left or right?

I knew I had only one chance.

I turned right, running along as fast as my burning lungs allowed. The street seemed to be empty. No car, no pedestrian as far as I could see.

Had I made the wrong turn?

God, I hoped not.

The street ended at the next corner, where there was a stop sign. As I reached it, I heard a strangled cry.

On my right, leading in a southerly direction was a narrow street, lined on both sides with blank, windowless walls. Halfway down the street, was a group of four men. And in their middle ...

"Bella!" I cried at the top of my lungs.

The men froze for a second, three of them turning to look at me. The last man was pressing Bella against the wall, kissing her brutally. Her blouse was halfway off her shoulders and the man's hands roamed over her exposed skin.

I roared in fury.

The light in the street wasn't the best and in the falling dusk I couldn't see Bella clearly, but it was obvious in the sagging of her shoulders that she had recognized my voice. She tried to push her assailant away from her, but he wouldn't budge.

"Let her go!" I commanded, as I stepped closer, catching my breath.

For a moment, I thought they would. People like this were usually cowards. Face them with opposition and they ran. But then they seemed to realize that I was only one person and they were four, and their stance changed.

"And you're going to stop us?" a heavyset man sneered at me.

"Yes!" was all I said.

I had no idea how I could fight four men at the same time. Other than a small pocket knife that I always carried with me, I had no other weapons, and the knife was pretty useless in this situation anyway. I knew a little bit of self defense, though I never followed any particular style. Jasper and Emmett had both trained with me when I had grown up. It had been more for fun than anything else, as I had no chance anyway against their vampire strength, but I did pick up a few tricks. I thought my chances were pretty good in a normal one-on-one fight, but four against one, that was a totally different matter.

Ultimately, it didn't make a difference. I had no choice. I had to help Bella, that was all that counted.

One of the men laughed out loud. "This will be fun," he said, detaching himself from the group and coming towards me. He had blond, curly hair and didn't look much older than myself. I had stopped maybe ten feet away from them, my feet planted firmly on the ground, my hands at my sides. They were shaking, but I tried not to show it.

"Bella, are you okay?" I called, watching the blond guy through slitted eyes as he came closer.

"I'm fine," she replied, a quiver in her voice.

_Bella, why do you have to lie in a situation like this?_

The blond guy was now within my reach and he didn't loose any time to take a swing at me. I evaded him with ease, ducking sideways and coming up on his right. With both my fists I hit him on the back, causing him to stumble forward.

"Hey," he cried as he whirled around to face me again.

This time I blocked his arm with my left and served him an uppercut to this stomach. He umpfed as the air left his lungs in one violent rush.

The others now realized I wasn't the easy target they had believed me to be and two more made to move over to me. The one holding Bella to the wall moved away from her a little, but maintained a firm grip on her arm.

I took a few steps away, hoping for some more room to maneuver. If they managed to surround me, my chances to get out of there in one piece would be greatly diminished. Not that it mattered. All that mattered was that Bella got away.

"Bella, run!" I cried, hoping she would get a chance to.

The first of the two newcomers, a burly, dark haired guy, tried to rush me, but I stepped aside, and he ended up stumbling past me, aided by my punch to his back. This however put me into the path of the third guy, who lost no time to aim a fist at my face. I ducked and he missed me by less than an inch.

The first guy had recovered a little from the hit I had managed to get in and now tried to get to me, but, luckily, the last guy got in his way. I took two steps backward and managed to get a little bit more room to maneuver in.

For a moment, we watched each other with wary eyes. The three men stood in a loose semi-circle with me at its center. We were a couple of yards away from the last man and Bella, and between two of the attackers I got another glance at her. Number four had let her go for now, and I screamed in my mind for her to run, but she seemed to be frozen to the spot, incapable to move.

With odds of three – probably soon four - against one the smartest move would have been to run like hell, but I wouldn't, no couldn't do so. Not as long as Bella was here as well. My best chance was to work them against each other. They were obviously not used to work - or fight - in a team, so I would need to arrange it that they would get into each other's way. All I needed to do was to buy Bella some time, so she could get a grip and get away.

I moved slowly to the left, trying to keep an eye on all of them.

Blond guy rushed me, fury evident in his eyes. This time my block didn't work and he hit me on the shoulder painfully. I stumbled, trying to regain my balance, when the next guy jumped me and pushed me to the ground. He tried to pin me down, but I rolled and managed to get out from under him. Before he could try again, I jumped back on my feet and with one fluid move I kicked the feet out from underneath him. He landed on his ass hard.

I laced my hands together and hit him on the head as hard as I could. Blood gushed out of his nose and he rolled on the ground, holding his face.

"Fuck, the bastard broke my fucking nose."

One down, three more to go.

The others hadn't been idle while I finished off the dark haired man. One bowled into me sideways and I landed on the ground with a jolt. Somebody got a kick in, then a second, and my side exploded in pain.

"Edward," I heard Bella call desperately.

'Run, Bella!' was my only thought. I was incapable of speech.

I curled into a small ball, my hands over my head, hoping to offer as little surface for them to hit as possible. While they had their fun with me, I hoped Bella would get away, get some help.

If she did, everything would be worth it.


	15. Chapter 15

Suddenly the kicking stopped. I heard an angry roar and above me something soft collided with something very hard.

"Edward!"

A cold hand touched my shoulder and instinctively I curled even further into myself.

"Edward," the voice said again. "It's me, Carlisle."

Finally I recognized the voice and instantly I relaxed. If my family was here nothing else could happen to me. Or Bella for that matter.

"Bella?" I asked, my voice rough.

"She's all right," Carlisle informed me. "Thanks to you. But I need to take a look at you."

I loosed up more and found myself lying on the ground next to a kneeling Carlisle. Around me the four assailants lay unconscious or dead - right now I didn't care - a furious looking Rosalie crouching low and watching them with angry, almost black eyes. Emmett stood a few steps away, his hands balled into tight fists, his face contorted in an enraged snarl. He looked ready to kill. With the scent of blood in the air, I was surprised the attackers were all still in one piece.

Bella was standing against the wall further away, her eyes wide, terror written plainly in them. When she saw me stir, she pushed away from the wall and ran over to me.

"Edward!" she cried out, falling to her knees next to me. She hesitantly reached out one hand, but didn't dare to touch me. "You are injured."

What was it with this girl? Here she had nearly been raped – and just the thought of that possibility made my blood boil – and all she worried about was that I had gotten a few bruises.

I tried to get up and gather her in my arms to comfort her, but instantly regretted moving. Okay, maybe a bit more than a few bruises.

"Ouch." My side was on fire and I had trouble drawing in a full breath of air. Bella's eyes flew from my face to Carlisle. She looked panicked.

"It might be a good idea not to move for the moment," Carlisle recommended with a soft chuckle as he let his hands roam over my upper body.

No shit, Sherlock.

"Looks like you managed to crack a rib or two, but nothing is broken there. What else hurts?"

I thought about that for a moment. The attackers had managed to get only a couple of good kicks in before my family had intervened and, luckily, none of then had been wearing hard boots. My leather jacket also had provided me some protection.

"I think one of them got me in the left leg, but my side is the worst by far," I replied honestly. I looked at Bella and saw her sagging in relief. Once again she reached out with her hand and I took it into mine, holding it firmly. Her eyes were impossibly wide as she watched Carlisle continue to examine me.

Carlisle's hands moved down to the leg I had indicated, ghosting over it with a feather light touch. I knew his sense of touch was so heightened compared to a normal human he was able to detect breaks better than any x-ray machine. He then instructed me to move my arms and legs, watching me closely as I did so. Everything functioned with a minimum of pain, so it looked like there would be no permanent damage.

"You're going to live," he announced eventually. "I would like to tape your ribs before we get out of here to help you with your breathing. It will most likely bother you for a while and I can give you something for it, if you want."

"No drugs, please," I said and he nodded in acceptance. I had the feeling I needed a clear head tonight and didn't want it addled by drugs. Right now the pain wasn't so bad I couldn't cope with it.

My parents had moved over to stand behind Bella. Rosalie's stance relaxed minutely as she heard the news that I would be fine. She cast me a concerned glance and I returned it with a weak smile. I knew she probably was angry at me for - once again - getting injured because of Bella. But there was nothing I could do about it, and at least this time there were no broken bones.

Carlisle held out his hand to help me up and I accepted it gratefully. Standing upright was no picnic and even taking a simple breath hurt. But the pain was bearable for now and I tried to hide it from Bella.

"Are you all right?" I turned to her, taking her face into my hands.

"I'm fine," she insisted. I felt her shaking and wondered if it was from the onset of shock or from the cold. Her blue blouse was torn in places and she didn't have a jacket on. So I shrugged out of mine and wrapped it around her. My leather jacket had seen better days and I didn't know if was possible to clean it again, but at least it was warm.

"Thanks," she whispered.

I wanted to take her into my arms, hold her and never let go of her, but I didn't know if this was a good idea after what had happened. I didn't want to bring bad memories back to the surface.

She solved that problem by taking one more hesitant step closer to me and leaning, gingerly as if afraid she might break me, against my chest. With a deep sigh – which wasn't a good idea; when would I learn that breathing deeply hurt? – I wrapped my arms around her, placing my chin on the top of her head. I closed my eyes, breathing in her sweet, flowery scent and felt her relax in my embrace.

It was perfect.

I knew I could stay like this forever, with her in my arms, but eventually I would have to let her go. I had to find out what she had seen and what she made of it. I was sure that she had seen more than was good for her, and she had already been far too curious about my family before.

We also needed to sort out what to do with her attackers. I wanted them to pay for what they nearly had done to Bella. I was sure this hadn't been the first time they had attacked a young woman and if not stopped there was no reason for them not to try again. But this would mean involving the police and then we would need to explain what had been going on here. I didn't know what they had seen and if they started to ramble on about people with super speed and super strength then we would be in deep trouble. The easiest solution would naturally be to kill them, and for their crimes I almost thought they deserved it. They had tried to rape Bella and no punishment was too harsh for that in my book.

I lifted my head, looking at Rosalie and Emmett. I knew they wouldn't lose any sleep over killing Bella's attackers – that was if they would sleep at all, which they didn't. Nobody would ever find them because vampires were very, very good in hiding their traces. I guessed practice made perfect. But Carlisle would be set against it for he valued every human life, even that of criminals, and his opinion weighted a lot with my parents.

In the end, though, it was Bella who made me decide in favor of not killing them. She would know about it even if we tried to keep it away from her and I didn't want her to feel she was in any way responsible for it. Which she wouldn't be, but I knew her well enough to know she would think she had something to do with it.

"What have they seen?" I asked Rosalie over Bella's head. I felt Bella stiffen in my arms and I held her even tighter then before.

Rosalie grinned predatory and huffed a laugh. "They have no idea what hit them."

Good.

Reluctantly I released Bella by taking a small step backwards. I wanted to see her face.

"Bella, what do you want us to do?" I asked her gently.

"What do you mean?" She looked slightly confused.

"Those men tried to rape you." Just saying it pained me. "Do you want us to call the police?"

She instantly shook her head in denial. "No, don't call the police, please. If they come, Charlie will know. He would go crazy." She started to shake again and it was all I could do not to pull her back into my arms.

I nodded, taking once again her face into my hands. She calmed immediately. "Okay, no police. I get it. Do you want us to take care of them?"

"Take care?" She looked confused. Suddenly she paled and I felt her Adam apple move up and down. "You mean …? Are you going to …?"

"We will not kill them, Bella." Carlisle had stepped up to us.

She looked over to him, doubt plainly written in her eyes.

"We do not kill," he said emphasizing every single word. "This is not what we are."

"What are you then?" she asked, barely loud enough for me to hear. There was an edge of panic in her voice now, but she fought to repress it. She looked over to Rosalie and Emmett, then back to Carlisle. "What are you?"

Her breathing quickened.

"Bella." I made her look into my eyes. "I'm as human as you are," I told her, putting as much conviction into my voice as I could.

"But then … How? How did you know where I was? How did they do what they did? Rosalie … she threw that guy against he wall like it was nothing. And they moved so fast, so unbelievably fast. I know I saw it. This wasn't normal. Not human."

Her eyes brimmed with tears and I didn't know if they were from fear, anger or frustration. Possible from all three.

"I'm human, Bella," I told her once more. "But my family, well, they're not."

"Wah?" was her not really intelligent, but nevertheless very understandable reply.

I sighed, remembering this time not to breathe out too deeply. "My family … they are all vampires."

Bella opened and closed her mouth several times like a fish out of water, but no words came out.

"Bella?" I asked. Maybe she was going into shock now after all. Not that I could blame her. It was a lot to swallow. I was ready to catch her if she should faint.

"Edward is telling the truth, Bella," Carlisle now said in his best doctor voice. "We are vampires. We are very strong, very fast and we do not age. But we do not live off human blood, but drink animal blood instead. We value all human life and don't kill."

"But how …?" she asked again, pointing at me and then at Carlisle.

"Could we have this talk someplace else? Preferably someplace with food. You really need to eat something after that shock."

"You want me to eat something? Now?" she asked perplexed.

I simply nodded. Bella had received quite a shock and she needed to get something into her to up her blood sugar level.

The headlights of two approaching cars let us all look up. I was surprised nobody had shown up before now, but since the whole thing had started we had been the only people in that street. It was dark by now and the street light next to where we were standing was broken. My guess would be that this was part of the reason the attackers had chosen this very spot, but now it also had helped to prevent drawing unwanted attention to our own activities.

The Mercedes pulled up, with the Jeep right behind it. Esme, Alice and Jasper got out, though Jasper stayed with the cars, possibly because of the smell of blood in the air. Luckily Bella hadn't noticed it so far, or more likely, so many other things had been going on she hadn't paid it any attention.

Esme stepped up to us, pulling me into a gentle half-hug. I was sure they had listened into what we had said and knew exactly what the situation was.

Alice moved to the attackers, looking at them with a thoughtful expression. She bent down to search for their wallets, pulling them out of back pockets and the inside of their jackets. As she flipped through their IDs a grin spread over her face and she danced back to Jasper and the Jeep. It looked like she had an idea.

"Edward." Carlisle placed a hand on my shoulder. "I still want to tape your ribs up," he reminded me.

He led me to the back of the Mercedes. His medical bag was in the trunk and he made me take off my shirt, so he could start working on me. As I undressed, I heard Bella gasp. She had stayed close to me, never letting go of my arm. I liked it, but suspected her behavior was mostly because of the revelation that she was now surrounded by vampires, and I, as the only human, was possibly the safest person to be with. Which was after all very true. She had taken it all rather well, I thought, with a minimum freak out and – so far at least – no fainting.

I looked down and saw a dark red-blue stain on my torso where the guy had kicked me. I felt at the edge of it to see how far it extended until Carlisle slapped my hand away so he could get access to the area. He sprayed some cooling stuff on it and immediately I felt myself relax as the pain receded a little.

"I'm so sorry, Edward," Bella gasped.

"Bella, I'm all right," I responded with a breathless laugh. "You were the one attacked," I had to remind her.

"I'm fine. He really didn't manage to do anything to me before you came. But you're hurt. Again. Because of me. I was so afraid for you when they all went after you." Her voice quivered and she bit her lower lip. She exhaled softly.

"Bella, just the thought of what those men could have done to you pains me more than those bruises ever could. I'm just glad I was here in time to help you."

It was nothing but the truth. I would gladly suffer far more than a few bruises if that meant she would be safe.

Carlisle made me lift my arms, which turned out quite painful. I didn't say anything though and bit the inside of my cheek so I wouldn't aggravate Bella any more than I'd already done. I don't know why she thought my injuries were because of her – after all she hadn't been the one kicking me – but it was obvious she did blame herself for them somehow.

After Carlisle was done and I had lowered my arms again, I found that breathing was now much easier and almost painless. I thanked him, but he waved it off. I pulled my shirt back on.

Alice now came up to us, showing us the IDs she had collected earlier.

"I had Jasper check those guys out."

I knew Jasper never traveled without his laptop and was more than capable of hacking into any database in the world.

"We got two hits. Alonzo Wallace is wanted in Texas and in Oklahoma for murder and other things." She didn't say which other things, but I had a very good idea on what they might be. I only hoped Bella didn't catch on. "The second one is one Jeffrey Hasenklein. He's wanted in California for assault. There's nothing on the other two, though we could cook something up."

"You can do something like that?" Bella asked with astonishment in her voice.

Alice chuckled. "We can. Trust us."

"Why am I not surprised?" she asked purely rhetorically.

Rosalie now joined our little group. "We're going to take care of them, Edward. How about you two go and get something to eat now?"

I nodded, grateful to my family to take over the clean up duty.

"Do you have something for Bella to wear?" I asked her and she nodded. Bella's blouse had large tears in it and if we went into public she needed something else.

A minute later Rosalie came back with a light blue colored silk blouse and a dark blue cardigan, and Bella went around the car put them on.

"Thank you, Rosalie," she said after she had changed. She handed my jacket back to me. I was almost reluctant to take it back, as I'd rather liked the thought of her having something of myself with her. But taking a look at it, I realized that the jacket was pretty beaten up and that she deserved something far better than it.

"What time is it?" she asked then.

I checked my watch. "6:20."

"Oh," she said, sounding surprised. "I thought it would be much later already."

I had to agree with her. It had been less than an hour since I had met Jessica and Angela and they had told me that Bella had gone to that book store, and so much had happened in that short period of time.

"I told the others we'd meet at the Bella Italia in ten minutes."

"Do you want to go there?" I could understand if Bella wanted to be with her friends now. I would be disappointed, though, as I would have liked to spend time with her alone.

But she shook her head and I breathed a sigh of relief. "No, I don't want to explain this to them. I don't want them to know. Besides, you promised some explanations."

"All right. Does Jessica or Angela have a cell phone?"

She nodded. "I think so, but I don't have the number."

"No problem," Alice piped up. She pulled out her own cell phone and spoke into it quickly. Within a few seconds she had the number she wanted. She made the connection and handed the phone to Bella.

"Just tell her you're with Edward and that you'll get a ride home with him," she told Bella.

Bella nodded.

"Jess? Yeah, it's me, Bella. Yes, I'm fine. Listen, I met Edward at the book store and he offered me a ride home."

I couldn't hear what Jessica said, but it must have been an affirmative, for Bella nodded. She listened for a moment longer.

"That's okay," she then said. "I can go with Edward."

Again Jessica interrupted her. Bella rolled her eyes, miming mouth movements with her hand.

"Okay, I'll tell him," she said as soon as she got a word in edgewise. "I've got my jacket still in your car, though. Is it okay for you to bring it to school tomorrow?"

Jessica must have agreed to that, for Bella nodded again.

"Thanks. See you tomorrow then."

She hung up before Jessica could get another word in and passed the phone back to Alice.

"Thank you."

Alice smiled and placed the phone back into her hand bag.

"Where do you want to go to eat?" I asked.

She shrugged her shoulders. "I don't know any restaurants here, to be honest. Charlie's not exactly one to go far for his food and so far we've only been to the Coffee Shop in Forks."

I nodded. I'd driven past that place a couple of times, though I'd never been inside. Actually, I hadn't been to many restaurants so far to begin with. My family's diet was something that didn't exactly go well with eating out in public.

While I had been browsing the boardwalk earlier today, I had seen a couple of restaurants and I tried to remember any that would appeal to Bella's taste - whichever it was. I had no real idea what she liked to eat, other than what had found its way on her tray in the school cafeteria and that wasn't exactly the best indicator in the world.

"Do you like seafood?" I recalled one place that had looked quite nice from the outside.

"Seafood's fine," she said. "We should stay away from Italian though. I really don't want to run into Jess or Angela."

I agreed. For my own very selfish reasons I wanted to have Bella all to myself. And besides, it would make answering Bella's questions somewhat easier.

"All right, Michael's Seafood and Steakhouse it is."


	16. Chapter 16

Michael's Seafood and Steakhouse was located at the lower level of a historic building in downtown Port Angeles. They offered a good selection of seafood and steak, but also had pizza and pasta on their menu. When we arrived, I asked for a booth and seconds after the hostess had led us to our seats, a waitress showed up to take our orders for something to drink. I asked for two cokes and she disappeared to get the drinks. I looked around and found that for a Tuesday night and it being still off-season the place was pretty well visited. More than half the tables were occupied and the waitresses dashed between them with practiced ease.

I pretended to look at my menu, but actually watched Bella from over the rim of it. She looked fantastic in Rosalie's clothing, the blues of the blouse and the cardigan doing something to her skin to make it almost glow in a soft ivory color. The silk of the blouse clung to her slender body in a lovely way, and it was cut low enough to show off the way her neck elegantly rose above her shoulders. If I'd been a vampire, I didn't know if I would have been able to restrain myself from devouring her.

She looked up and caught me staring at her before I could look away. She blushed, but I also could see a grin playing around her lips.

"What are you thinking?" I asked before I could stop myself.

She grinned more openly now. "I'm thinking that if you were a vampire, I would be your dinner."

My face fell. Even though this had been exactly my thoughts just moments ago, I couldn't allow her to make fun of it. She was in enough danger alone from her scent that was so appealing to my family. She had no idea in what danger she was just from being with me and in association with my family. I knew my family was in control of themselves and they would never intentionally harm Bella, but she still was in danger.

I dropped the menu and leaned forward to grab her hands. I looked deeply into her eyes, trying to convey the seriousness of the situation to her. "Don't ever make fun of this, Bella. You don't know what you are saying."

She froze, looking slightly stunned for a moment. Then she blinked as if waking up from a dream.

"I thought you said your family doesn't kill humans," she said, sounding a little breathless. I hoped I hadn't scared her too much, for scaring her was the last thing I wanted to do, but at the same time I hoped I had. She had to understand that my family was still very, very dangerous.

I sighed. "No, they don't, but it's not easy for them. Humans are so much more 'tasty' for them than animals. We do smell so very attractive to them and it is sometimes very difficult for them to be among humans without the thirst taking over. When it does, there's no control, no stopping them. My family has a lot of practice with it, but they are not infallible."

"Then why do they go to school if it's so hard for them to be among normal people?" Her eyes glittered with true curiosity.

"They want to appear as human as possible. And that means going to school. It's usually only for a year or two and if you're immortal this isn't so much time, really."

Our drinks arrived together with a small basket of bread. We both pulled apart to allow the waitress to place the glasses on the table. The waitress - her name plate gave her name as 'Vivian' - asked me if we had already decided on what to eat, but I shook my head and she left again.

I pushed one glass at Bella. "Drink," I insisted.

She gave me a strange glance, but then picked up her glass and took one long swallow. I followed her example, being very thirsty all of a sudden. The cold liquid felt good to my parched throat and I finished the glass in three quick gulps.

"So, how does that immortality thing work out?" she ask curiously, putting down her equally empty glass.

I shrugged. "Once you've been changed you don't age anymore. You look the same, be it next year, ten years or a hundred years from now. Vampires won't get sick and it's practically impossible to kill one."

"So, stakes, and crosses, and sunlight and all that are just myths?"

I nodded. "As far as I know only a vampire is strong enough to kill another vampire. I've never seen it, of course, but Jasper had a bit of a rough past, so he told me once."

"How old is your family really?"

"Carlisle was born sometime in the 17th century, Jasper during the Civil War. The others are all from the beginning of the last century."

"Wow!" she said, clearly stunned by that information.

"You know, you're taking this all pretty calmly," I wondered. I had expected her to run away from me screaming by now, but really she just sat there, watching me, rather composed, with her wonderful, brown eyes, as I told her one unbelievable thing after another.

She tilted her head and smiled. "I had some time to get used to the idea that your family is not quite what it seems to be. Remember when you saved me in that accident?"

No, I didn't, not really, as my memory of that morning still hadn't returned and wasn't likely to return ever. No need to remind her of this, though. I nodded.

"To get to you, Emmett pushed that car away from us with super strength. I know I saw it, but he denied it and I had no proof. But I started to watch your family after that and I noticed a few things."

"Like…?" I prompted, curious on what had given my family away.

"Well, the non-eating thing for one. I noticed that even though the others got some food, you were the only one actually eating it."

She had commented on this before.

"Well, as I said, the cafeteria food is not exactly to their taste," I reminded her with a wink.

She inhaled sharply when she remembered where my family's taste truly ran to.

"So they really … they do … they drink blood?"

I nodded, adding a little half shrug for good measure. "Every two to three weeks they need go hunting. They usually go pretty far in order to not draw any attention to themselves and to our home."

I didn't want to go into too much detail on this topic. For one, the thought of somebody living on blood was not exactly an appealing one. I'm used to it, hey I knew of it for all my life, but Bella didn't. She might be disgusted by it and it wasn't really the most suitable topic for a dinner conversation in any case.

Bella looked curious still, but luckily Vivian decided it was time to ask us again if we had chosen something we wanted to eat. I took a short glance at the menu, really looking at it for the first time.

"Bella, what do you want?" I asked her, while quickly browsing through the selection.

She furrowed her brows, as she looked down on her own menu. She then quickly decided to order the Shrimp Pasta.

"I'll take the Fisherman's Bounty then," I informed Vivian, picking something more or less at random. "And some more coke, please."

I handed my menu back to the waitress and forgot about her a second later.

"You said you noticed a few things. What else was there to notice?" I asked the moment Vivian was out of earshot.

Bella had taken a roll out of the bread basket and began to shred it into small pieces before popping them into her mouth.

"One day, I saw you and the others standing together. It was cold and I could clearly see your breath in the air, but not that of the others. I thought it was strange, but I couldn't find an explanation."

I hadn't been aware that Bella had been watching us as closely as she obviously had done.

I slowly nodded. "You're very perceptive. Most people wouldn't have noticed. My family doesn't really need to breathe - at least they don't need the oxygen to survive. Most times, though, they still do it. The reason you didn't see their breath is that their body temperature is very low and when they breathe the air doesn't get saturated with moisture."

I could see that she was listening to me with rapt attention. Her eyes were fixed on my face, her hand frozen halfway between the bread before her and her mouth. For a moment I forgot what else I wanted to say. The highlights in her hair shone even in the dim light of the restaurant and the candle flame between us was reflected in her warm brown eyes. I reached out to take her free hand and was thrilled that she didn't try to withdraw it. Her hand was warm in mine and without any conscious thought or planning I started to stroke the back of it with my thumb.

Time was lost to me. The sensation of her skin against mine was exquisite and I knew I could have stayed like that for a very, very long time.

Somebody close by cleared her throat and I looked up the see Vivian with two fresh glasses of coke standing next to our table. Bella blushed a deep crimson and pulled her hand out of mine with an abrupt move. The sense of loss I felt was only topped by my annoyance at the waitress for spoiling the moment.

She placed the glasses on the table and took the two empty ones. "Your food will be here in a moment."

I had been too well brought up to tell her what she could do with her food, though she must have seen something of my thoughts in my eyes, for she retreated rather quickly.

Bella giggled and I looked at her with a raised eyebrow.

"What?" I asked a little irritated, though I couldn't be really angry with her. I don't think I ever would be able to be angry with her. Maddened, frustrated, exasperated, yes, but never angry.

"You're not really fair to her, you know," she said, grinning.

I tilted my head in an unvoiced question, hoping for some more explanation.

"First you dazzle her and now you look like you're ready to kill her. The poor girl has no idea how to react to you."

I furrowed my brows. "What do you mean with 'I dazzle her'?"

She sniggered, but then abruptly grew serious. "You really haven't noticed?" she said, as if surprised by some revelation.

I made a gesture to indicate I had no idea what she was talking about.

"You must know what effect you have on people!"

I had an effect on people? What the hell was she talking about? But that raised an interesting question for me.

"Do I have an effect on you?" I asked.

She suddenly looked away, blushing more than I had ever seen her do, obviously very embarrassed.

"I'm sorry," I quickly apologized. "I shouldn't …"

She interrupted me with a quick shake of her head. "No, it's all right. I shouldn't have brought it up. But, yes, sometimes you do have an effect on me." She gazed at me from underneath her lashes, her hair half hiding her face.

I blinked. Was she saying what I thought she was saying? And if she was saying what I thought she was saying, did that mean what I thought it meant?

"Bella," I reached again across the table for her hand and luckily she didn't seem to be disinclined for me to take it. "If I have an effect on you, you also have very much an effect on me. I … I think … I think I really, really like you."

Gosh, what a stupid thing to say. As if those few words were able to express the depth of the feelings I had for her? But, surprisingly enough, it seemed like this time I had managed to pick the right words, for Bella's face lit up with a stunning smile and I felt my breath catch at the beauty of it.

"You do?" she sounded pleased, and breathless, and a little overwhelmed herself.

I nodded. "Bella," I began. "You mean so very much to me. From the moment I saw you for the first time, I knew I wanted to be with you. When I'm near you, I feel happy, and if you're away from me, I'm not."

For a moment longer her beautiful smile illuminated her face, but then the corners of her mouth dropped and she looked away once more.

"Then why did you leave me alone for so long?" she whispered and pulled her hand out of mine.

"Oh, Bella, don't you see? Because I wanted to be with you I had to leave you alone."

She blinked, attempting to understand the meaning of my sentence. A small crease appeared between her brows and she looked at me in confusion.

"You're not making sense."

I sighed deeply, feeling a twinge of pain coming from my ribs, but ignored it.

"I told you about my family? That they are vampires, right? And that it is difficult for them to be around humans because of our smell?"

She nodded, but clearly didn't quite understand what I was going for.

"Sometimes, very rarely, they come across a human that smells so much better to them like an average person. So much better it's nearly impossible for them to resist. They try, but it's very, very hard for them."

Something like understanding lit up her face. "And I'm one of those humans?"

I nodded.

"And you were afraid they could do something to me?"

"You seem to have a talent to get into trouble, you know. And when Alice had a vision that you might be killed by a vampire I thought it best to stay away from you, to reduce the risk."

"Alice saw I get killed by a vampire?" she squeaked.

Oops, I hadn't meant to say that.

"I'm sorry, I … well, she doesn't, not any more. That is, there's still the possibility you might get killed by a vampire, but it won't be by one of my family," I rambled on, seemingly incapable to stop myself.

"One moment, let me get this right," she interrupted me. "Alice can see the future and she saw me getting killed by a vampire?" I could sense it took some restraint to keep her voice level.

I stopped. I thought I had mentioned Alice could see the future, hadn't I? Or maybe I hadn't gotten to that point yet.

"Didn't I tell you that Alice has visions of the future?"

"I think you neglected to mention this little fact," she responded sarcastically, though I believed she wasn't really serious, as she also smiled a little.

"I'm sorry. Her gift is the reason I could find you so fast. She promised me to look out for you and when you got into trouble she knew and she gave me a call and that's how I got to you in time."

Almost in time, I corrected mentally. I should have been there before those foul men ever had a chance to even touch her.

"Does it bother you?"

I mean, I just had told Bella that Alice had seen her being killed by a vampire. I expected her to freak out.

"No, not really, though I'm curious. Is this a vampire thing?" she asked sounding rather calm.

It took a moment for me to realize that she had inquired about Alice's ability. I really had thought she would be more interested in her own possible death.

"Yes and no. Most vampires are fairly normal. That is, they don't have any unusual powers. There are some, though, that develop something a little bit more supernatural, something like Alice's visions. It is a fickle gift, really, as the future is not set in stone. It really depends on decisions people make and if you or I suddenly should change our mind about something, the outcome will change. For example, Alice would see you getting food poisoning because you ate some bad chicken, but before you order the chicken dish in the restaurant you suddenly decide you'd rather have fish that day, so you won't get food poisoning and the future she had seen has changed."

"So if Alice informs me I will get food poisoning because of bad chicken, all I need to do is to stay away from the chicken and I'm fine?"

"Exactly. So when Alice saw that you're in danger because of my family we decided that it would be safer for you if I'd stayed away. After the choice was made, you were safe again. Only, I didn't fare very well with this decision and eventually I couldn't do it any longer."

She thought about that for a moment.

"But eventually her visions changed and I'm no longer in danger from your family?"

"Not quite. As long as I was 'good', the vision didn't change: I stay away, you're safe. But when I couldn't do it any longer and caved, and she looked into the future to see what the consequences of my decision might be, she discovered that my family is no longer a danger for you. They now understand how much you mean to me and what I would feel if something should happen to you.

"But, as today has shown, you don't need any additional risk in your life. You do manage to get into trouble like nobody I've ever met. What were you doing in that area anyway?"

She ducked her head at this and had the decency to look chagrined.

"I got lost," she admitted with a blush. "Jessica told me about that bookstore, but when I got there I saw it was not what I was looking for. So I tried to find something better, but somehow ended up in the wrong direction."

Our food arrived then and I urged Bella to start eating. After the shock she had suffered today she needed to get her blood sugar level up, and, to be honest, so did I. I dug in, finding the fresh fish over fettuccine and tomato cream sauce quite tasty. For a few minutes we both concentrated on our meal. I watched Bella eat, noticing how she surreptitiously pushed the capers in her sauce to one side of the plate, while obviously enjoying the rest of her food. I loved this little quirk of her. It showed me that she wasn't perfect, that there were things she didn't particularly liked, but that she also didn't make a big fuss about it.

After our first hunger was somewhat sated, Bella picked up the thread of our conversation.

"How is it to grow up with vampires?"

I had to think about that for a moment. It wasn't as if I really had a baseline to compare my life to. My family was all I had ever known. I had known from the beginning that they were somehow different from the parents and families of my friends, but always in a good way. When I had been younger, I always had somebody to entertain me, to read me a story or sing me to sleep. When I had a question I always could find somebody to answer me. When I was in danger of falling down, I could count on somebody to pick me up before I got seriously hurt - which led to some interesting situations, like when I once tried to jump off the roof of our house to see how far I could get, utterly unafraid of getting injured. Rosalie had been furious back then – that was after she had caught me.

I was pretty sure that my parents had read all available books on child rearing they could get their hands on, from every single book by the American Academy Of Pediatrics to the volumes of Dr. Spock. As far as I could judge - being a bit biased on the whole issue - they had done a reasonable good job in the end. I know they could have been a lot more clingy than they had been, but I had been to kindergarden with all the viruses that swarmed around those places, and to pre-school. I had had soccer practice and one year, while we lived in Canada, I had even played ice hockey, which resulted in a spectacular break of my left leg. They allowed me to make my own experiences, my own mistakes.

Of course, there had been the family secret to keep.

When I had been seven or eight an ancient coven in Italy, the Volturi, learned of my existence. They sort of acted as a ruling body for the vampire society, enforcing one law above all: no human could learn of the existence of vampires and live. As I was obviously human and equally obviously knew my family's secret I should have been killed. Instead we had all been invited to Italy and I had been presented to the Volturi court. I had been too young to understand what was going on, though I still remember how scared I had been. In the end I had been allowed to live, as my bond to my family was so strong it was very unlikely I would ever betray them.

Of course, now Bella knew, but then I knew she wouldn't tell anybody.

I decided to not mention the danger she was in by the Volturi, at least not for now.

"How is it to grow up with vampires?" I repeated her question. "Not much different than growing up in a normal family, I would think. There were some perks, like twenty-four hour story reading services if required, but other than that I believe it was fairly normal. I did get some unusual support in school sometimes, like in history where I got some first person insight into historic events. In sixth grade I had to give a report on the Civil War, and Alice and Jasper made me an authentic copy of a drummer boy's uniform to wear. When I gave my presentation, I had all those gruesome details - which were all true - but my teacher thought I had made them up and she only gave me a 'B'. Jasper was furious."

Bella laughed at the picture I presented and I also had to grin at the memory.

She asked me more questions about my past and I was only too happy to answer them. I even admitted my roof-jumping adventure, which got me a gasp and a giggle. As I, in turn, was curious about her past, I also asked questions about her and how she had grown up in Phoenix. Her mother seemed to be a bit of the free spirit and there were many stories which made me laugh out loud.

Before we knew it, the waitress was back to clear our plates and asked if we wanted something else. I asked, once again, for more coke, though I wasn't really thirsty any more. I just wanted to spend more time here, time with Bella. Luckily, Bella was willing to follow my lead.

I'd noticed before that time had a funny way of expanding and contracting simultaneously whenever I was around her. Even though I knew we talked for hours, and I enjoyed ever minute of it, it felt like only moments had passed by the time Vivian laid down the check on our table in the not so subtle hint that it was time for us to leave. Bella made to reach for it, but I snatched it out from under her hand.

"I'll pay," I told her, not allowing for her even to offer to split the bill. I glanced at the check and stuck a note inside the booklet that covered the bill plus a good sized tip. Not that I had been too impressed by the service – the waitress had interrupted us too often in my opinion – but I had spent a wonderful time here. Though practically everything what made that time so wonderful had to do with the girl that sat at the other side of the table.

I got up and held out my hand to Bella, which she readily accepted.

On the way back to Forks Bella and I continued with our game of asking and answering questions. I quizzed her on what she liked and disliked, and she reciprocated in kind.

As soon as we reached the outskirts of Forks I fell silent. I realized that my time with Bella for today was coming to an end, and this filled my with a feeling of sadness I couldn't quite explain. Just the thought that I had to take her back to her father and that I wouldn't be able to see her for more than ten hours was almost too much to bear. Thoughts of just driving on, keeping her with me in the car forever entered my mind, though I knew I was getting ridiculous.

Of course, I didn't drive on. I got us to her house and stopped the car, but couldn't get myself to get out and open her door. I closed my eyes, breathing in her scent that had filled the car, inhaling _her_ as much as possible.

She also was silent and she didn't make a move to get out, though I know she should, she had to.

Eventually, I felt a warm hand on my arm and my eyes flew open, looking at her in the dim light of the porch lamp.

"Edward," she said, her voice low, almost sad.

"Bella?"

The left side of her mouth lifted into a wry, lopsided grin. "Thank you. Thanks for everything."

And before I knew how, she bent over and planted a soft, quick kiss on my mouth.

Suddenly I was alone in the car. Frozen, I watched her walking quickly up to the door of her house and open it. She turned once more back to me before vanishing inside, waving at me with a smile on her face. Then she was gone.

My lips were tingling and I raised my fingers to them, feeling gently along their curves. My tongue darted out, tasting Bella on my lips. The corners of my mouth went up and after a few minutes I was grinning like an idiot.


	17. Chapter 17

I had no idea how I got home that night. It hadn't been that late when I had dropped off Bella; her father hadn't been home yet. I knew I had sat some more minutes in my car in front of Bella's house – the house Bella was in right at that moment, which made it the most interesting place in the world – but when I saw the lights of another car approaching, I finally managed to start my own car and drive away.

Only parts of my family were home when I arrived home. The others were still away to dispose of the scumbags who had attacked Bella. Emmett, Alice and Jasper were driving them to another state where they would leave them in the vicinity of some police station after leaving the information where they might be found and why it would be a good thing to pick them up.

Rosalie greeted me when I opened the door. She gave me one single look and a smile appeared on her lips as she saw my expression. I tried to glower at her, but my heart wasn't in it. I was simply still too friggin' happy to be angry at her.

"I don't think I need to ask how your dinner went."

"Dinner went fine, thank you," I responded curtly. The last thing I wanted right now was an interrogation on how my evening with Bella had gone.

She got my hint, luckily, and let me pass as I went for the stairs and my room. I needed a shower and a change of cloth. I also wanted to give Bella a call, to ask her if it would be all right with her if I picked her up for school tomorrow – and, of course because I wanted to hear her voice.

I was also tired, but at the same time so wired, I knew I wouldn't be able to sleep. My thoughts circled around Bella and the kiss she had given me.

Bella had kissed me!

Just the thought of that brief contact, of her lips on mine, made me grin again. From all that grinning I was doing lately I was going to get muscle spasms in my face. Not that I cared.

The emotional high that Bella's kiss had given me lasted exactly until I started to peel off the bandages enveloping my torso so I could take the shower. Instantly I felt a stabbing pain emanating from my cracked ribs. I had to lean against the sink for a moment, taking in carefully measured, shallow breaths as I tried to get control over the pain. I tried not to make a sound, for this would certainly bring one of my family come looking for me. I remembered Carlisle had offered me some pain meds earlier, and maybe it was a good idea to accept them before I went to bed.

Once the pain had receded to a more tolerable level, I stepped gingerly into the shower stall and put the water on as hot as I could stand it. I closed my eyes, letting the water cascade over my face and my body, allowing it to relax me and to wash away the grime and dirt that had found its way onto me in that fight in Port Angeles. Lathering up I winced once or twice as an unlucky movement aggravated my ribs once again. Soaping up my hair proved to be painful as well and lifting my arms above shoulder level was a lesson in hurt. I managed somehow, but it left me breathless and aching. I had no idea how I would be able to get the excessive water out of me hair once I got out of the shower.

I tried to delay my leaving of the shower as long as I could, but eventually I had to get out or else I would turn into a prune. Or I would dissolve and be drained away with the used up water. Finally I opened the stall door, only to see a pale arm offering me a towel.

I should have known my family would eventually check up on me.

With a sigh – carefully, shallow – I accepted the large bath towel and wrapped it around my hips before stepping out. To my relief it wasn't my mother who was with me in the bathroom but Carlisle. I loved my mom, really, I do, but I didn't know if I would have been able to accept her mother-henning right now. Carlisle was by far the better option. He was treating patients every day and with him I could pretend that he was just my doctor, even if he was so much more than that.

Even though Rosalie and Emmett were my parents, and for that reason alone were the center of my family and I loved them, Carlisle was the soul of our family unit. As much as I looked up to my parents, they did look up to him, adored him, revered him. He had created them both, saving their lives in the process. And he had shown them that even with the monstrous side that came with being a vampire, there was no reason to give in to it and become the monster they feared.

"If you don't mind, Edward, I would like to take another look at you," he asked gently.

I did mind – a little, I hated being fussed over – but on the other hand I was in pain and I knew that I couldn't hide that from him. Actually, it would be stupid of me to do so. So I simply nodded and he directed me to sit down on the bed.

He was fast but thorough. When he touched my side I couldn't hide a wince and he was even more careful after that. The bruise that I had only seen once before in the dim light of the street where the attack had taken place, looked to be no bigger than my hand. It had a reddish blue color and just looking at that thing seemed to make it hurt. Carlisle allowed his hands to ghost over it, his face not betraying any feelings, though he pressed his lips together once when he, despite his gentleness, managed to induce another harsh inhalation from me.

He also examined my left leg meticulously, but other than a large bruise on my upper thigh where the foot of my attacker had connected, there were no issues there, and that bruise hurt less than a percent of the one on my side.

"Like I suspected, your seventh and eighth rib are cracked, but not broken. I will give you some ointment that should help a little, but I'm afraid you'll feel them for a while."

I nodded grimly. I just had healed from my broken collar bone and I knew it could take a long while. Unlike my previous injury, however, my ribs couldn't be immobilized completely and because of that I would feel them every time I breathed in too deeply.

Carlisle applied the salve, trying to hurt me as little as possible, and the blessed numbness I felt after was worth every wince.

I yawned suddenly, my energy draining out of me as if somebody had pulled out the stopper in a bath tub. Suddenly, all I wanted to do was to sleep, and as I was already sitting on my bed I just leaned over and let myself fall.

I heard Carlisle chuckle as if he was far away, and my last thought was that I had forgotten to do something important, but for the life of me I couldn't remember what it was.

*

The next morning I woke up to bright light that was coming in through my window. It was still overcast, but it wasn't raining and by Forks' standard it was a lovely day. I sat up, only remembering belatedly that moving too fast wasn't a good idea. Surprisingly enough, it hurt only a little and when I looked down at me, I saw that my ribs had been taped up once again and that I somehow had ended up in my sweats and the t-shirt I usually slept in.

I glanced over to my alarm clock and saw that it was time for me to get up if I wanted to be in time to pick up Bella for school. And then I remembered that I had forgotten to call her, and my good mood from moments before evaporated.

While I was trying to get my comb to pass through my thick, unruly hair – a difficult endeavor on the best of days, but today almost a futility – I argued with myself if I should just pick her up anyway, or wait for school before seeing her. As I really didn't want to waste any time being away from her I was all in favor of the first option. But what if she didn't want me to do that for her? What if she already thought that little kiss from yesterday had been a mistake? It hadn't even been a real kiss, if I thought about it. Maybe she had aimed for my cheek and it had ended up on my lips by accident. What if I was wrong and what she felt for me was nothing like what I felt for her?

I almost groaned as those thoughts chased around in my head like gerbils in a wheel. Maybe I should stay home today. I was sure Carlisle would write me a slip, attesting that I had fallen or something and that I needed to recover. It wasn't too far from the truth after all, even though at the moment the pain wasn't really the problem.

But the thought of not seeing Bella for a whole day was enough incentive to get me moving. That thought was inconceivable to me. Even if she wouldn't want to continue where we started yesterday, just knowing I was in the same building as she was would be enough for me, even if she should not want to see me.

I hadn't noticed the rest of my family coming back last night, but when I came down the stairs, I saw Alice waiting for me. She held out the keys to my Volvo to me.

"If you want to pick up Bella, you better hurry," she told me with a knowing grin. "There will be an accident on the 101 in fifteen minutes and if you get stuck in there, you will be late."

"Will she …" I started, but she held up her hand.

"All will be fine. Don't worry about us, we'll take Rose's car."

She threw the keys at me and I caught it one-handed. I hesitated for one more moment, then gave her a quick peck on the cheek and rushed out to my car.

I was early in town, more than half an hour before school was about to start. Bella's truck was still waiting in the driveway, but there was no sign of her father's police cruiser. I was still debating with myself if I should get out and ring her door bell, then the door to her house opened and she stepped out.

At the sight of her I instantly felt better and I felt a smile tucking at the corner of my mouth. I got out of my car and walked up to her truck, waiting for her to come down the stairs. She wore jeans today and a tan pullover that was a little bit too large on her and effectively hid her slender curves from my sight. I immediately developed a dislike to that piece of clothing, but then I remembered that Bella's jacket was still with Jessica as she had left it in her car last night. It wasn't very warm this morning, so maybe that pullover had been the best option.

"Good morning, Bella," I greeted her.

"Edward." She looked up from the ground, obviously only noticing that moment I was here. A wide grin spread over her face and instantly all my concerns that she might not want to see me again evaporated. She was beautiful and for a moment I almost forgot to breathe.

I swallowed, suddenly anxious again. "I was wondering," I started, twisting my hands nervously, "if you would want to ride with me to school today."

A light blush colored her cheeks, but then she nodded. "I think I would like that," she all but whispered.

The drive to school was quiet. For once I had no idea what to ask her. Yesterday I had had about a million questions and I had only scratched the surface of the miracle that was getting to know Bella. Today I couldn't remember a single one of them. Just having her in the car with me was enough though, hearing her breathe softly next to me, inhaling her scent. She was silent as well, her eyes distant, her thoughts a million miles away.

It wasn't very far from her place to school and we arrived with still more than fifteen minutes to spare before class started. The parking lot was mostly empty still. I parked the car, reluctant to get out.

"Is your family coming today?" she suddenly asked.

I nodded. "They're going to take Rosalie's car," I told her.

"Good."

I wondered if she was nervous to meet my family again. She had interacted with them before, many times, really, and never had been nervous. But that had been before she had known they were vampires. Suddenly knowing something like this certainly would change somebody's perspective.

I decided that maybe the best was to ask her directly.

"Are you concerned about my family? Now that you know, I mean."

I could sense that she was about to shake her head, but then she changed her mind. She placed her hands into her lap and looked at them, avoiding my eyes in the process. "It's not that I'm afraid of them now or anything like that. It's … I don't know, really. They are so perfect, I mean, and I'm not, and with them what they are and me what I'm not, I'm not sure why you even could be interested in me." The last couple of words were rushed out almost too fast for me to understand them.

I almost laughed out loud, but knew that this would be very much the wrong reaction now. Did I get this right? She was afraid I wouldn't be interested in her because my freaking perfect family of vampires? Hadn't I just this morning been thinking she wouldn't be interested in me? Was she blind?

"Oh, Bella," I said, reaching for her across the middle console of the car, taking her hands into mine. "You have no idea. They aren't perfect, not at all. They all have their little flaws, their faults. You … you are so much more to me. I want to spend as much time with you as possible. Just leaving you yesterday … it was hard, really hard. I … I want you."

Doubt had still been in her eyes, but when I told her I wanted her, she finally smiled. I replied in kind.

And then I leaned over and placed my lips on hers. For one short, agonizing moment I thought I had made a mistake, that I had gone too far. But then I felt her response, felt her increase the pressure of her lips against mine. Her mouth opened a fraction and her sweet breath filled my mouth, my soul. Her taste was so much better than I remembered from last night. I knew if I died now, I would die a very happy man indeed.

Eventually we had to pull apart. We both breathed heavily. I searched her eyes, wanting to know what she was thinking, wanting to know if she also felt the same emotions, the same turmoil that stirred my very being. I shouldn't have worried, though, for her smile was all the answer I needed.

"Edward?" she whispered my name.

"Hmm?"

She grinned mischievely at my non-reply.

"I think we need to go to class."

I blinked once, twice, fighting my way back to the reality that we were in the school parking lot and that school was about to start soon.

"Do we?" I asked almost with the whine. Why did I have to go to school now? There were a millions things I'd rather do right now, and everyone of those million things had something to do with Bella.

"Hmhm," she nodded. With a sigh she turned away from me to open her door.

"Wait," I said quickly, holding up my hand. As fast as I could I got out on my side and ran over to hers to open the door for her. I took her school bag from where she had thrown it on the backseat together with mine, then I sketched a little bow and offered her a hand.

"Mylady, may I accompany you to your class?"

She grinned again and nodded. "You may, good sir." She placed her hand into mine and together we walked up to the school building.


	18. Chapter 18

Thanks to everybody reviewing this. I now have over a 100 reviews, which is so cool in so many ways. You guys are making my day(s)

* * *

The next couple of days went by as in a dream. I picked up Bella before school, then carried the bag for her to her first class. Between classes I waited for her, for I couldn't bear to stay away from her any longer than I had to. At lunch we always sat together on a small table of our own. We talked about everything and nothing, no topic was too uninteresting or boring. I wanted to know everything about her and it seemed Bella was thinking the same, for a never-ending stream of questions was directed at me as well.

After school I drove her home and we sat together in front of her house for hours, mostly talking, but sometimes just listening to music. She was fascinated by my piano playing and admitted that she was listening to the CD of my recordings I had given her every night before going to sleep. She wanted to know if I could sing and wouldn't let go until I proved to her that this was not the case. She said she liked it still, but I know my singing voice wasn't anything to write home about and she didn't ask me again.

We kissed again.

I can't describe how her kisses made me feel. Just the thought of them was something to let my lie awake at night. They were so much better than anything I had experienced before. I had kissed other girls, but there was no comparison. I realized I wanted to do more, much more than just kissing her – though, there wasn't anything 'just' about our kisses – but I knew with absolute conviction I wouldn't want to force her to do anything she didn't want to. The shadow of her near-rape was still lingering over me and I made very, very sure not to do anything or to touch her in any way that could disturb her. So I took to taking a very cold shower every evening and every morning instead.

My family was insufferable. Alice was walking around with a self-satisfied smirk on her face and every time she saw us at school, she grinned over both ears. If I weren't so grateful for her help I would have smacked her, even knowing I probably would only hurt myself. It was the thought that counted.

Emmett took me aside after the first day and wanted to know if he needed to give me The Talk. I know I turned a deep red, rivaling the worst I had ever seen on Bella's face. Ultimately I managed to convince him that I knew about everything I needed to know and that his help wasn't needed, thank you very much. I still don't know if he had been serious.

When I was home I had a hard time to concentrate on my homework. The teachers in my class had already noticed that I seemed a bit distracted lately, but so far I had managed to keep up in class. It helped that many of the lessons were actually nothing new to me, as I had worked through a lot of the material ahead of time. I always had liked to learn things. When I was done with my homework, I usually went down to the piano. That melody I had started to play with on the weekend wouldn't let me go. I could feel that I was close to what I wanted with it, but the last little bit to make it perfect – to make it worthy of Bella – eluded me for the longest time.

Then, on Friday night, it finally fell into place. Playing it through for the first time I could imagine her lying on a bed, her hair spilled out around her head like a halo of sorts. Her eyes were closed and her chest was slowly rising in deep sleep. The melody took on almost physical form as it wove around her, caressing her with its gentle touch. It moved in the rhythm of her breaths. It was perfect.

It was Bella's lullaby.

I looked up and, like when I had started working on the piece for the first time, I saw Carlisle and Esme standing there listening to me playing. They both smiled and I didn't need Jasper's talent to know they were happy for me.

* * *

Bella had asked me to come to her house by eight AM on the day we were driving to Seattle. She wanted to introduce me to her father before we were setting of.

I had to admit, the thought of meeting Chief Swan made me nervous. Of course I had met him before several times, even before Bella had moved to Forks, though I doubted we had exchanged more than five words at the time. When I had been in the hospital after Bella's accident, he had come to visit me once. He had naturally been very grateful I had saved his daughter's life and had told me so. But now, meeting him again in the capacity of my girlfriend's father, was something so very, very different. I hoped he didn't see it as a reason to shoot me and that I still had some bonus left from the time I saved Bella.

I rang the bell, more nervous than I was willing to admit, but when Bella opened the door for me, her sight eased my anxiety. Just seeing her always made me feel so much better.

"Good morning, Bella," I said, a smile on my face.

"Edward." She smiled as well and it took everything I had not to draw her to me and kiss her. Only the knowledge that her father was only a room away stopped me. I could see by the twinkle in her eyes that she was thinking the same.

Chief Swan came from the kitchen into the entranceway looking for who had arrived.

"Good morning, Chief Swan," I greeted him politely.

He didn't say a word, looking me up and down like a suspect in a rape case, his lips pressed together, his eyes hard as steel. I expected him to tell me to assume the position and pad me down for weapons next. I almost fidgeted, keeping myself from shuffling my feet with a supreme act of will. Bella placed her hand into mine and instantly I felt a hundred percent better.

Finally, after what seemed like forever, he moved his head in an infinitesimal nod.

"You'll be taking care of my girl?"

"Yes, sir," I swore to him. I would never allow anything to happen to Bella. In that regard we were of one accord.

He looked at me a little bit longer, as if to see if he could really trust me, but finally he must have come to the conclusion he could.

"All right. You have fun." The last was aimed at Bella, though he cast me a glance indicating clearly that if _I_ should have too much fun, he would shred me to tiny little pieces too small to be identified. I believed him.

Bella let go of my hand and went to the kitchen to get her bag. On the way in she placed a quick kiss on her father's cheek, which made Chief Swan smile, though the moment his eyes came back to me that smile was gone.

"Dad, we'll be back by eleven. I put a casserole into the oven - you only have to heat it for 30 minutes. I left a note on the fridge. Please don't burn it like the last time."

He mumbled something unintelligible, looking a little bit sheepish for a moment.

He watched from the door as we got into the car and then drove down the street until we were out of sight of the house.

Bella heaved a sigh of relief. "That went better than I thought it would," she said, snickering.

"I expected him to pull out a lie detector to question me about my intentions towards you the whole time."

"And what would those intentions be?" Bella asked, looking over to me with a wide grin.

I didn't have to think about this. "To treat you like the queen you are."

"And you are my shining knight in armor, coming to the rescue to save my life and my virtue."

"Maybe the knight in the old leather jacket, but always at your side to rescue you from whatever you need rescuing from."

Bella might be talking in jest, but I was dead serious. I would never leave Bella alone ever again and with the rate she was getting into trouble, I knew there would be more chances for me to rescue her. She was a magnet for trouble and keeping her safe and sound might turn out a full time job. Not that I minded the least.

The drive to Seattle took a little over four hours. We took a break at a gas station after about two hours, stretching our legs, taking care of some necessary business. Bella offered to take over driving duty and I agreed. I didn't mind driving, but why risk getting tired if somebody could spell you?

Even though it had been overcast when we had left Forks, once we left the Olympic Peninsular the weather cleared up and the sun came out. As it was lunch time when we arrived in the city, I asked Bella what she wanted to eat. She opted for sandwiches and so we went to a nice coffee shop that offered take-out and found an empty bench at the Occidental Park.

"Why does your family avoid sunlight?"

Bella was pointing her face towards the sun, her eyes closed to half slits. She had finished her sandwich, but seemed to be quite content to remain where she was right now.

"What made you say that?" I had my suspicions, but wanted hear what Bella was thinking.

"Why else move to Forks?" She turned to look at me. "I looked it up. Forks is the one place in the US with the least amount of sunshine. And, last week, when there actually, really was some sun, they ditched school. It's not that they turn to dust in the sun, or anything like that, isn't it?"

I shook my head, thinking how to explain it to her.

"Remember when I've told you all those old legends are nothing but myth and don't hold any truth?"

Bella nodded.

"Well, there's one thing that makes vampires stand out from normal people like you and me. When they are changed, their whole body is changed. It turns hard like stone, absolutely impenetrable. And their skin, it's like … marble, I think is the best comparison, or maybe diamonds. And when the sun shines on it … they sparkle. It is quite noticeable. And as we always try to blend in, they can't show themselves to others in the sunlight. I have to show you sometime. I'm sure somebody will be willing to demonstrate. It's quite impressive, really."

"Wow!"

I nodded in agreement. It was an impressive sight and one I never got tired of, even though I was used to it.

"Have you ever thought about changing yourself?"

That question got me to sit up.

"What do you mean by that?"

Bella shrugged. "I was just thinking if you have ever wanted to become a vampire yourself. I'm sure the topic must have come up at one point."

"No!" I said firmly, though more as an answer to her first question. The topic had come up, naturally, for one couldn't grow up in a family of vampires and not think about it. But my opinion on that matter was clear. I knew only too well all the problems that came with being a vampire. Of course, I knew there were many advantages, like being super strong and super fast. A vampire was practically invincible. Your mind, your brainpower increased tenfold once you were changed. They were all things most people would see as ample compensations for the down sides. Like the blood drinking, first of all. Even if one would be able to substitute on animal blood, like my family did, it wasn't a pleasurable thought. And the thirst for human blood would always be there, an eternal struggle to fight the monster, fight with oneself, being always afraid to slip up, just once. I saw how my family suffered every single day, even though they were very good at hiding it. And then the immortality. Yes, I knew that many people would see it as the biggest advantage, but I didn't. Just to imagine to stay the same forever and to watch the person I loved grow old and die without being able to do anything about it. My family was living through it, knowing that I would change over time, while they … they always would stay the same. Still, they never had asked me if I wanted to be changed, knowing that I wanted to stay human. And now there was Bella. If for no other reason, that would be enough to want to stay the way I was right now. I loved Bella and if I had a chance, I wanted to live a normal life with her. Which I couldn't do if I was a vampire.

Bella looked at me, surprised at my firm denial. I smiled wryly and tried to explain. "I know you think being a vampire is cool, and in a way it is, but there are many drawbacks, too many for me to want to be one. My family has to fight every day with what they are. Not that they are unhappy, they all have arranged themselves with what they have become. But believe me, if they'd have a chance to turn back to being human, they would do so without a second thought."

Bella looked still doubtful. Maybe it took somebody as closely involved with vampires as I was to see all sides. Bella only noticed the advantages, not that I could blame her.

"If I'd be a vampire, I couldn't be with you," I explained, taking her hands to my lips and kissed them gently. "I wouldn't be able to resist you, much like I'm unable to resist you now. But as a vampire, I would kill you. I would not be able to stop myself."

Her beautiful chocolate brown eyes grew wide when she realized what me being a vampire would mean for her … for us. She freed one hand and cupped my face with it. I leaned into her touch, my eyes closed, savoring the feeling of her skin on mine. Without another word, she pulled me closed and we kissed. Hungrily, almost desperately, I opened my mouth, pulling her in.

Only the need to breathe made me break the contact. Bella was heaving deep breaths herself, her cheeks flushed pink, her hair slight mussed where my hands had forked through it. She lowered her eyes, though I saw a smile playing around her lips.

She swallowed. "I think I see your point," she admitted, then leaned forward once again for another kiss.

We spent the afternoon browsing through bookstores. My family did have an extensive library and we constantly added to it, though most times we bought online. Watching Bella buying books was a totally different experience. Entering a new bookstore, she usually started out in the classics section, running a finger over the spines of all books, sometimes picking out a book, looking at the cover and the back, before returning it to the shelf. In some cases she placed the book in the basket at her feet. Whenever she had five or six books in there, she picked up the basket and took it to one of the armchairs to look through them more thoroughly. She read the beginning then a section in the middle of the books, then, eventually, she got back up and, replaced most of the books again. Out of one hour of doing this, she picked maybe one or two books to buy. Once she was done with the classical section, she began to wander through the store, looking for whatever caught her fancy.

Even though I spent most of my time watching Bella – still my favorite pastime by far – I managed to find a couple of books for myself, especially after Bella had chased me away, claiming I was distracting her. One book was on the Civil War and I was fairly certain Jasper hadn't seen that one before, another one was for Alice on fashion at the turn of the last century. I now was looking through a book on classic cars, wondering if Rosalie would like it. Her taste normally went more for modern and fast, but there were some seriously sleek looking cars in there, and so I decided to buy it for her anyway.

I was looking if I could find something for Emmett, who was rather difficult to shop for, when Bella stepped up to me and wrapped her arms around me. I had been so engrossed in the selections before me that I hadn't noticed Bella stepping up to me. Grinning, I turned in her arms until I could place my arm around her shoulder.

"Are you done here?" We had entered the Elliot Bay Book Company maybe two hours ago, but it was huge place, taking up an entire block of old brickwork buildings, and I believed I had seen less than one third of it so far.

Bella held up a shopping bag obviously containing her purchases. "I'm done. But what about you? You had said you wanted to come to Seattle for some reason."

I looked at her blankly, trying to remember when I had ever said something like that to her.

"That day after you started talking to me again, you remember?" she plowed on. "You said you needed to go to Seattle anyway and then asked me if I you could give me a ride."

Oops. I grimaced, ducking my head a little. I wasn't very happy to be caught in a lie, though, to be honest, it had only partially been a lie. I had wanted Bella to believe that I wasn't doing her a favor when I offered her a ride, knowing that she would refuse me if she thought so. And, really, it wasn't just an act of kindness, not for the reasons Bella would probably have thought back then. Ever since I had heard about her plans to come to Seattle I had hoped I could be included in that trip, that I could spend time with her. That was all I had wanted.

"Maybe," I began, "maybe what I need to do here is to spend time with you."

"But you said," she started once again, but then hesitated suddenly. "Oh, are you saying the only reason you wanted to come here was because of me?"

I bobbed my head in an affirmative. "Bella, all I want is to spend as much time with you as possible. You should know that by now."

Her eyes grew wide, but then a wide grin spread over her face. "You know, Edward, you are really terribly cute."

"What?"

She went on her tiptoes to place a kiss on my nose. Still grinning, she took my hand to pull me outside into the sunshine. I stopped her just long enough to pay for the books I've found for Alice and Jasper, then followed her more than willingly. Once outside, she proceeded to pull me down towards the piers and the busses that ran there along the city center.

"Where are we going?" I asked. I was willing enough to follow Bella everywhere she wanted to go, but it would be nice to have a destination.

"It's a nice day," she said, smiling at me over her shoulder, "We still have over an hour before we need to leave and I've never been on the top of the Space Needle."

What else did I need to know?


	19. Chapter 19

It took us quite a bit longer than an hour to get to the Space Needle, stand in line for the elevator, get up to admire the sight – which, I have to admit, was fantastic – and get back to my car. With the ten o'clock deadline looming over our heads and my unwillingness to give Chief Swan any reason to be angry with either of us, I didn't exactly stay within the speed limit on our way back. I was used to driving fast and I enjoyed it, but Bella was shocked when she noticed the first time how fast I really was going. Only when I pointed out to her that if, should she be home after curfew, she might end up being grounded did she concede, though I could tell she wasn't exactly happy about it. I wondered how she would react if she would ever end up driving with one of my family. Compared to them my driving was downright tame.

We reached Bella's home with a few minutes to spare. Once again I was in the situation that I needed to leave Bella, which obviously was something I didn't want to do, but I didn't really have a choice in that matter. With a sigh I got out of the car and opened the door for her. I took her shopping bags out and together we walked up to her porch. There I hesitated, trying to drag out the moment a little longer.

"Bella, what are your plans for tomorrow?"

"Why are you asking?"

"I was wondering, if you'd have some time, maybe I could come over. Or maybe we could go somewhere. Just the two of us. Nothing special really. But only if you don't mind."

A smile was playing around her lips. "I don't mind at all," she said. "But I need to do laundry. And I have homework to do."

"Maybe I could bring my homework over and we could do it together," I offered, hopeful, eager.

"I think I would like that," she said bashfully, looking down at her feet, though she couldn't hide her smile.

When she looked up again, she bit her lower lip, and I couldn't resist her anymore. I placed her bags down, put my hand against the back of her head and pulled her into a deep kiss. I felt her response eagerly and for a moment I forgot that on the other side of the door was Bella's father, who must have heard us arriving and probably was waiting for her to finally come in. Bella, however, seemed to remember and after much too short a time, she pulled away from me. With an apologetic smile she picked up the shopping bags and dug her keys out of her hand bag.

"Charlie's waiting," she whispered in ways of an explanation, as she unlocked the door.

My lips still tingled from the kiss and I pressed them together to stop me from reaching for her again for another one, Charlie's presence being damned. I heaved a deep sigh.

"Thanks for today, Edward."

"I have to thank you. It was great." That was a huge understatement, but what else was I to say?

"I see you tomorrow then?"

"What time?"

"How about two?"

"Sounds good to me," I confirmed. I would have come at six in the morning, if she'd ask me, but maybe she had other things to do in the morning so I didn't push.

I waited for her to step inside and heard her wishing her father a good evening. After the door had closed behind her, I waited a moment longer before I slowly dragged myself back to the car. I was only halfway there when I noticed the light in one of the upper floor windows being switched on. I stopped, turned around and saw how Bella opened the window to that room, leaning outside.

"Edward," she called after me.

Like a flash I was underneath the window, looking up. I hadn't known so far which room was hers, but now that I knew I instantly evaluated the chances for me to climb up to it. It didn't look too difficult. There was a plant covered trellis at the corner of the house left of Bella's window and it looked sturdy enough to hold my weight.

"Did you forget something?" I asked. I was pretty sure she hadn't left anything in the car, but maybe I had overlooked something.

"No, I just wanted to tell you a good night."

I grinned, then decided I would chance it. I took a few steps back, then ran and jumped until I got a good grip on the trellis. My cracked ribs complained a little bit, but not so much as to cause me to let go again.

"Edward, what are you doing?" I heard Bella gasp.

I reached and climbed further and before Bella could say anything else, I arrived at her window. I pulled myself over and found myself face to face with Bella's face.

"Edward, are you crazy? My dad will hear you," she hissed frantically, but she looked more stunned than angry.

Yes I was crazy – crazy about her.

"I just want to give you a good night kiss," I said, grinning like an idiot. As I was holding myself up on the window sill with both arms I couldn't reach for her and all I could do was to offer her my lips.

She hesitated for a moment, undoubtedly waiting still for Charlie to thunder up the stairs, but when there was no sound coming from inside the house her lips curved also into a grin.

"You are crazy," she confirmed once again and then leaned forward to plant her lips on mine.

"Absolutely crazy about you," I mumbled once our lips parted again, though our heads stayed close together, her forehead leaning against mine. My arms began to shake with the strain, and my ribs now let me know that it really hadn't been such a good idea to climb up the wall of her house, but I wasn't ready to climb back down just yet.

"You need to go," she whispered, though I could sense she didn't really want me to.

"Sweet dreams," I whished her.

"I will dream of you," she said.

"So will I," I promised.

It was half past eleven by the time I arrived home. As my family didn't exactly sleep I was not surprised to see them all still up and about. Jasper and Emmett were involved in a game on the Playstation, virtually beating each other into a pulp, while Alice and Rosalie were cheering them on. Carlisle was reading some medical journal while Esme was knitting, the needled flying faster than the eye could see. My guess was it was for one of the new fashion designs Alice had been working on lately – she had developed a certain fascination with knitwear claiming it to be the newest 'in thing', but professed not to have the patience to knit it herself. Esme was only too happy to do the actual knitting for her, for she enjoyed all kinds of needlework.

When I came in everyone looked up and Alice jumped up from her seat and danced over to me.

"Edward, how was your day?" she asked wrapping her arms around me in a quick hug, then pulled me over to the large sofa and the rest of my family.

There was no resisting her, so I sat down between her and Jasper and told the others a little of what Bella and I had been doing in Seattle, though I left out most of the details. Alice squealed when I gave her the book I had found for her and Jasper and Rosalie both claimed to love the ones I got for them.

"You've got any plans to spend time with Bella tomorrow?" Emmett then asked.

Instantly suspicious, I looked at my father, wondering why he was asking me. It was true, my family usually treated me like an adult and gave me a lot more freedom than one would expect for a seventeen year old, but when push came to shove they could very well decide to restrict my activities and how I spent my time.

"Why do you want to know?" I asked carefully.

"Alice says we will get a real storm tomorrow evening and we were thinking about playing ball. Maybe you could invite Bella," he offered.

I looked at him wide eyed and a grin spread over my face. We all loved to play baseball, but for my family to be able to do so certain weather conditions needed to be met. First of all, there had to be thunder. Vampire baseball was quite different than normal baseball, their strength and speed adding a level to the game that no human could ever achieve. When a ball, thrown by a vampire and batted by a vampire connected, the sound it made was very much like thunder and very loud indeed. In order not to draw attention to the noise, they always waited for a thunderstorm where the sound would get lost in the general thunder and lightning. I, of course, couldn't match their play. I was a decent enough pitcher by human standards, but when I pitched on one of our family games it was just too easy for them to hit the ball, because it was in no way fast enough. And when I batted I had no realistic chance to hit a ball pitched at vampire speed – that was if I saw it coming at all. So usually I ended up being referee. I didn't mind though, because just being there, when they let go of their inhibitions, just had some innocent fun - which they did rarely enough - was pretty damn cool.

What surprised me though was their invitation for Bella. I thought the general idea was still for her to stay away from my family, unless something bad was about to take place.

My heart skipped a beat.

I turned to face Alice. "Did you see something happening to Bella?" I asked, not quite accusingly.

The smile on her face disappeared like a light that had been switched off and she lowered her eyes. This only made me feel more apprehensive.

"Alice?"

"No, nothing to her, really. Don't worry."

"But there's something going on," I stated now, looking at everyone of my family in turn. Something was going on and I hated that they were trying to hide it from me.

Rosalie sighed, placing her hand on my arm. "Edward, it's really just a precaution. Alice has seen some nomadic vampires moving through the area tomorrow, and we want to make sure you two are safe with us. It's not even likely we're going to meet them at all."

I looked into her eyes, trying to see if this really was the full truth. Nomadic vampires usually meant normal vampires – as in vampires who drank human blood. I had encountered some of them before, not many though, and always from within the protective circle of my family. Once it had been made clear to them I was not to be touched, the other vamps usually left quickly, as they didn't want to bother with a group as large and as strong as my family was. I suspected more than half of them thought of me as a sort of pet or a handy meal for my family, as they couldn't understand how anyone of their kind was willing to give up human blood.

Finally, I nodded. If there really were other vampires around, I also felt better knowing Bella protected by my family. Knowing her and her talent to get into trouble, she would end up right in front of them and I preferred that this happened with my family there to protect her.

"I'll ask her and I'm sure she'll be interested."

Instantly I noticed my family relaxing.

Jasper offered me the controls for the game console. "You wanna give it a try?"

I accepted the controls and actually managed to win one of the fights. Though I suspected this had more to do with my mother distracting Emmett just when he was about to kick my butt for the gazillionth time.


	20. Chapter 20

The next morning I was restless. Even though Alice had said that the other vampires were still far away I was nervous and wanted to be with Bella instead of sitting in the house, waiting for the time I could finally drive over to her place. Eventually, I just gave up on pacing in my room and decided to go on a good long run. When Emmett saw me coming down the stairs in my running outfit, he instantly offered to accompany me. Normally he couldn't stand to slow down to my human running speed, so I suspected that he just wanted to keep an eye on me, being concerned about me the same way I was concerned about Bella. I didn't want to fight with him about his over-protectiveness, though, so I told him I'd wait for him on the back porch while he changed. As he didn't sweat there was no real reason for him to change into some running clothes, but there was always a chance we could meet somebody and appearance did matter.

I didn't have to wait long, and soon we were both jogging at a relaxed speed along some trails cut through the forest. I didn't pay any attention where we were going, confident that I would always would be able to find my way back, and if not, Emmett would for sure. I lost myself in the rhythm of the run, allowing my mind for once not to think of anything in particularly. Soon I felt the tension inside of me loosen up.

After some time the forest ahead of us cleared and I realized we were getting close to one of the many bodies of water that were scattered all over the peninsula. The trail ended at a rocky beach belonging to a smallish lake. Further down the beach some larger stones where arranged in a loose circle and charred thrift wood showed that the site had been used before for bonfires. I saw a couple of broken bottles at one side, but other than that it was actually a quite nice location.

Emmett had trailed after me the whole time without saying anything, not unlike a CIA agent following the President as he was having a lazy jog through DC. All that was missing was the black suit, the sun glasses and the gun in a shoulder holster. Of course, even without a gun he was a hundred times more deadly than any CIA agent in the world.

Even after the long run I was barely out of breath, feeling only a light twinging from my ribs. Trying my whole life to keep up with my vampiristic family ha led to me being in pretty good shape. I knew trying to keep up with them was a hopeless endeavor, really, for there was no way I ever would be able to physically match them in any way, but that never had stopped me from trying.

I stretched, then bent down to pick up some flat, smooth pebbles.

"Dad?" I began in a questioning tone. I flung one of the stones, making it skip over the surface of the lake. The first made three leaps before it disappeared underneath the water's surface. The next one went a little bit further.

"What's up, son?" He also picked up a couple of stones and copied my throwing motion.

"Bella asked me a question yesterday and it got me thinking about something. If you'd ever get the chance to turn back into a normal human, would you take it?"

He didn't answer immediately, but gave it a little thought, which was, considering how straightforward my father usually was, a credit on how serious he took the question. Eventually he sighed.

"If it were just me, I don't know. I've been a vamp for a long time now and there are many things about it that I do like. There are things about it, though, that I hate. You know your mother wouldn't hesitate if you ask her that question and I will follow her wherever she goes. So, if it would be a package deal, she and I, yes, I would take it in a heartbeat. If it were just me, and Rosie would have to stay the way she is, I would say no. I love her too much to do that to her."

I nodded. This was basically what I'd already figured. In my family everything came in pairs. Esme and Carlisle, Alice and Jasper, Rosalie and Emmett. In each pairing there was one who longed more to be normal than the other, but in the end it would always come down what the partner in question wanted.

"When Bella asked me if I'd ever want to be a vampire, I told her no. Just thinking to never age and that terrible thirst for human blood, while she remains who and what she is – I couldn't bear that thought."

Emmett nodded. "I see what you mean, Edward. We never really talked about it for we wanted you to have a normal life. I don't know if, would you have asked one of us to change you, we would have agreed to do it. You do know how it is for us, how we always struggle to be better than the monster inside of us, how it always is a fight. We don't wish that for you, especially now that you have found that girl. But you have to know that it will be hard for us as well. You growing old and us … well, not."

I knew and a part of me ached for them. But I was human and I wanted to remain that way. I knew they loved me enough to grant me a normal life, one where I could grow old together with Bella.

I felt my father's arm wrap around my shoulders and squeeze me gently. Then he took me and turned me so that he could look into my face. His expression was serious and there was an emotion in his eyes I couldn't immediately place.

"Edward, we do love you and whatever your future holds, you should know that we will be happy for you. When we found you seventeen years ago, I had had no idea how much joy you would bring to our lives. Every moment with you has been a privilege and a pleasure. You have turned into a fine young man and we all are incredibly proud of you."

What did somebody say to something like that?

I knew I blushed and I ducked my head. I had to blink several times to stop tears from escaping, then muttered something that might have been a thank you. My trainers suddenly caught my interest and I slipped out of Emmett's hold to re-lace my already perfectly laced shoes.

Once back at the house, I took a quick shower, ate whatever Esme placed in front of me, then got my school bag and drove off using Emmett's jeep. If Bella agreed to come to the game, we would need its four wheel drive to get to the playing field.

At exactly two o'clock I stood at Bella's door and knocked. A second later the door opened and Bella was in my arms, her lips on mine. For a good long time my thoughts were only on the incredible girl I was holding and kissing. Life was good.

"Missed me?" I asked jokingly once she let go of my mouth to take in some much needed air.

I felt her smile against my lips. "Maybe a little," she conceded.

She took my hand and pulled me inside. It was the first time I was inside her house and I took a good long look around. Until Bella had moved in two months ago, Charlie had lived here alone for many years and it showed in how the house was decorated. It was spotless clean, though if this was due solely due to Bella's efforts or if Charlie had had a hand in it I couldn't tell. My feelings in that matter went to the first option, though. There was little to show Bella's touch, but those I spotted immediately: a brightly colored quilt hanging over the back of the couch, a few books Charlie wouldn't be found dead reading sitting on one of the tables, some scented candles scattered around the living room.

Bella led me into the kitchen. The small table there was covered with her school books and notes and I remembered that she had said she needed to do homework. Well, so did I to tell the truth.

"Where's your dad?" I asked. I hadn't seen him in the house, though that didn't mean he couldn't be back from wherever he was any moment.

"Fishing," she said, with a bit of an odd sigh. "We already have enough fish in the freezer to feed half the town for a week, but he just goes out every weekend and brings in more. I do like fish, really, but I'm running out of ideas on how to prepare them."

Good. This sounded like he would be out for a bit longer. Knowing we wouldn't be disturbed, I pulled Bella to me and kissed her again.

"Maybe you should talk to Esme. She knows about a million recipes and I'm sure there are a few you haven't tried."

"How come?" Bella asked against my chest as she snuggled up closer to me. "I thought they don't cook, with your family being vampires and all."

I huffed a laugh. "My family might not need to eat normal food, but I do. Did you think I was brought up on take-out?"

I felt rather than saw her smiling. "Actually, I've been wondering. Isn't that a lot of work for them to cook for just one person?"

I shrugged a little. "You cook for two and you don't mind, do you? I think it's not that much different. I never thought much about it to tell the truth."

I really thought Esme didn't mind. She did have an interest in all kinds of housework, and I almost believed she enjoyed having somebody around to test her cooking skills on. Some of her more exotic experiments had turned out to be quite interesting, and there had been only very few meals I found inedible, either because they had turned out to be far too spicy for me – something which was tricky to do right if one couldn't taste the meal before serving it to me – or because I just didn't like the flavor. Esme had never been angry at me if I didn't like something she cooked and she always had some alternative ready for me to eat so I didn't need to go hungry.

"Do you have a lot of homework?" I asked now, indicating the kitchen table with her books.

"It's not too bad, really. Why do you ask?"

I grinned. "There's a thunderstorm coming in this evening and my family is going to play ball. They have invited you to come if you're interested."

Bella pushed away from me so she could look me into the eyes.

"Seriously?"

I nodded. "I promise you will like it. Vampire baseball is not like the normal baseball you know. It's actually pretty cool." I had no intention to mention the nomadic vampires in the area, which were part of the reason my family had extended the invitation to Bella. I didn't want to scare her.

She grinned, looking all excited. "What has the thunderstorm to do with it?"

I returned her grin. "You're going to see. Are you coming?"

"I'd love to."

"Great."

We dove into our homework, though, with Bella sitting just on the other side of the table it was difficult for me to concentrate. I caught myself a couple of times just watching her as she was bent over her work, her pink little tongue sticking out between her full perfect lips while she focused on a math problem or something else. She looked so adorable, I really had to hold myself back not to leap over the table and kiss her again. She must have noticed me watching her, for a crimson flush colored her cheeks then. I forced myself to go back to my own homework, but I knew my work was not up to my usual standards, for I actually had no idea what it was I writing in my essay for Government.

I heard Bella's father arrive just about the same time I was ready to give up on the essay as a hopeless job. It looked like I would have to rewrite the whole thing, but luckily I had two more days to do so, which should give me enough time.

"Bella, do you know who the big, red Jeep in the driveway belongs to?" Chief Swan came inside, shaking the rain off his hat, while he put his tackle away. He looked up and took a double take when he saw me in the kitchen. His hand moved automatically to his hip where I suspected his gun normally rode. I guess I was lucky he didn't carry his weapon when he went fishing.

"Good evening, Chief Swan." I rose from my seat to greet him.

"Bella?" His eyes searched for his daughter, the question 'what the heck is he doing inside the house' clearly written on his face.

"Hi dad," Bella welcomed her father back. "Edward and I have been doing homework together. I hope you don't mind."

He mumbled something that might have been a confirmation that it was okay with him, but then he narrowed his eyes once again as he glared at me.

"Is that Jeep yours? I though you drove a Volvo."

"The Jeep actually belongs to my brother Emmett. I borrowed it for today, for I hope to bring Bella with me this evening to play ball with my family."

"You're going to play baseball with Edward's family?" he asked Bella with a surprised voice.

Bella grimaced. "Well, I guess I'll do more watching than playing, but, yes, that's the plan."

"I never thought I'd see the day," he muttered more to himself than to anyone of us. "Well, more power to you then." That was aimed at me. For the first time I saw something like approval in his eyes when he looked at me.

"When will you be back?" Once again he turned to Bella. "You've got school tomorrow."

Bella looked at me questioningly. "Nine o'clock," I then said. "It will be too dark to play after." Not that my family needed the daylight to play, but neither Bella nor I had their night vision.

"All right then," he nodded.

We quickly put our books back into their bags and donned our rain jackets. In any other place in the world it would have raised suspicion that we wanted to play baseball in the pouring rain, but Forks was different in that regard. If something like a little bit of rain held you off from doing outdoor sports, none would ever happen here. Luckily I knew that we didn't need to worry, for Alice had seen that even though there was a thunderstorm coming in, she had also seen that the field we usually played in would stay relatively dry. Her predictions might be sketchy sometimes, but her weather forecasts were always spot on.

Chief Swan accompanied us outside, I guessed to take another look at Emmett's monster Jeep. The Jeep was huge, with big tires, metal guards over the headlights and tail lights and a couple of powerful spotlights attached to the front fender. In a way the car was a good reflection of Emmett's personality, very powerful and in no way trying to hide it.

"Where are you going to play?" Chief Swan choked out, obviously realizing that we didn't need a car like that to go to one of the normal playing fields in the park.

"My family owns a piece of land west of the 101, off the 68 mileage marker. We can't really do anything else with it, so we sat up a playing field there."

Chief Swan nodded, obviously placing the directions I'd given him on a mental map in his mind. We did indeed own the land there - and actually quite a bit more than that - though I didn't mention that fact. There wasn't much privately owned land on the peninsula, most of it belonged either to the government, like the national park, or to a few larger lumber companies. Well, one of those lumber companies was owned by a corporation, which in turn belonged to my family. We just didn't go around and mentioned that little fact.

I helped Bella into the Jeep and then assisted her to put on the off-roading harness, once it became obvious to me that she was confused by all those buckles. While I pulled the straps tight, I was very much aware how close my hands were to her legs, hips and chest, and I had to remind myself over and over that Chief Swan could probably see us through the window to stop me from kissing her. Eventually I had Bella secured and then strapped myself in.


	21. Chapter 21

Emmett's Jeep got us most of the way to the playing field, but there was still a good half mile hike from the end of the washed out service road where I had to stop the car as it couldn't go any further. Woods surrounded us on three sides, the road that usually only was used for lumber trucks the only access. I helped Bella out of the harness and then offered her a hand down. She looked a little bit green around her nose and I watched her with concern.

"Are you okay?"

She swallowed, then nodded. "Sorry, the road was a bit more … bouncy than I expected. Just give me a second, please."

I almost laughed out loud at her expression, but stopped myself at the last moment. Instead I took her hand and led her to sit on an old tree trunk that for some reason had been left behind when its brothers had been taken away the last time this corner of the forest that been harvested. It had stopped raining for now, though dark clouds hang low over us, waiting to deliver their load of lightning and thunder.

After a minute Bella's color had improved and she gave me a weak smile as I pulled her back up to her feet.

"It's a fifteen minute hike, I'm afraid. If you think you're not up to it, tell me now and we can turn back if you want."

She shook her head. "I'm fine, really."

I took another long look at her, then accepted her statement. She did indeed look better. I placed a quick kiss on her nose, then directed her to a narrow trail that led between two trees into the woods.

I allowed her to lead – it wasn't like the trail was hard to find – and gave her a hand whenever she needed it. She placed each of her steps carefully, which slowed us down a little, but after twenty minutes the trail ended in a wide open field, where my family was already waiting for us.

Rosalie, Emmett and Esme were closest to us, sorting through the equipment which was piled on one side of the field. Carlisle was a little further away, setting up the bases, while Alice and Jasper were standing a quarter of a mile apart, tossing a ball back and forth so fast it was all but invisible to the human eye.

Our playing field was about four times larger than the standard baseball playing field, the bases each about a hundred yards apart. With my family as fast as they were, anything smaller just wouldn't work. We also didn't have a limit to the outfield.

I was sure that the others had noticed us arriving long before we had come into view, but they acted as if they had only seen us once we stepped over the line that separated the forest from the field. Esme greeted us with a warm smile while the others now went to the pitcher's mount, huddling together as they decided who would be in which team. The decision was made quickly. Alice stayed where she was while the others started to distribute themselves across the field. Jasper went to pick up a bat from the equipment pile and went to home base. Esme got ready to catch.

I led Bella over to home base.

"You'll want to watch this," I said, grinning in anticipation as I placed myself behind Esme, my hand resting lightly on her back.

Bella noticed what I was doing and looked at me questioningly. "You're not playing?"

I shook my head. "There's no way I can compete with them, really, as you'll see in a moment. I just referee. It's fun."

Jasper took a couple of unneeded warm-up swings, the aluminum bat he had picked whistling through the air so fast it was a mere blur.

"It's time," Alice called out in her clear voice then pulled back her arm and let the ball fly.

A good mile away lightning flashed. Then the ball connected with Jasper's bat with a sound very much like thunder. The ball flew almost too fast for the human eye towards the outfield, where Emmett was already racing for it. Jasper dropped his bat and headed for first base.

I heard Bella gasp next to me and a grin spread over my face as I watched Emmett leap into the air and catch the ball in mid flight.

"You're out!" I called to Jasper, who already had passed first base and was on his way to second. He made a 'damnit' gesture, but then returned without protest to Rosalie, who was waiting on the sidelines, while Carlisle took his turn on the home base.

"I think I understand now why you need the thunderstorm," Bella said almost breathlessly, watching the game with excitement in her eyes.

We played for a good half hour, no team gaining a clear advantage over the other. Bella had quickly gotten over the extraordinariness that was vampire baseball and now cheered on every hit ball and every run.

It was Alice's turn to bat and she had stepped up to the base with the bat in her left hand. Even though she was not quite as fast or strong as the others, she had the advantage of exactly knowing where the ball would go. She never once swung her bat if the ball wouldn't go through the strike zone and if it did, she would hit it with incredible precision. Rosalie was winding up for her throw, when Alice suddenly dropped the bat and straightened up, a whispered 'oh no!' on her lips.

Instantly alerted, my eyes searched for Bella, who was standing next to the equipment pile, her face flushed pink with excitement, jumping from one foot to the others as she waited for Alice to play.

"What happened?" I hissed the question, while I raced over to where Bella was standing.

"I'm sorry, Edward. I didn't see them coming. They must have heard us playing and changed their mind. They're much faster than I thought."

The nomads. It had to be.

Carlisle and the others all raced to where I now joined up with Bella.

"What's going on?" She looked – understandably – confused when she saw how we all congregated on her, my family forming a solid wall of bodies between us and the world outside.

I ignored her question – she would find out soon enough – and turned to Alice. "Do we have time to get back to the car?"

She shook her head. "It's too late. They'll be here in a minute. Oh God, I'm so sorry." Her wide eyes searched mine and I sensed something terrible in their depth. There was fear in there and whatever caused that fear, it didn't bode well for me or Bella.

West of us, close to where the sun would set if it would be visible behind the cloud cover, I saw three shapes materialize out of the trees, quickly drawing closer.

I took Bella into my arms. "Stay with me," I whispered into her ear. "Whatever happens, keep your head down and don't say a word."

I felt her nodding against my chest, a shiver running over her body as she pressed herself against me. Even if she had no idea what was going on, it was very obvious to her that something was happening that put me and my family on edge. My family rearranged themselves so that they all now faced the new arrivals. Carlisle was at the center, with Esme at his side. Rosalie and Emmett flanked them on either side placed a little bit behind them, while Alice and Jasper took the places furthest to the left and the right respectively.

As they came closer I could see that there were two males and one female. They were all beautiful, of course, even though their clothing was frayed with wear and they were barefoot. Their eyes were a deep blood red, a sure sign their eating habits were different than that of my family – they drank human blood.

The man in front was the tallest of the three, with the darkest skin I've ever seen on a vampire. The second male, who stayed at the back of the group, was as average as one as beautiful as him could be, with short, light brown hair and regular, nondescript features. The woman had striking red hair that hung in wild disarray down to the middle of her back.

All three of them moved with a predator-like grace, reminding me of large cats hunting. Their sharp eyes took in our refined appearance, the upscale clothing of my family, and - most of all - our superior numbers.

The darker-skinned one smiled an easy smile, exposing a row of gleaming white teeth. He stepped forward and addressed Carlisle, whom he easily identified as the leader of our group.

"We thought we heard a game," he said with a slight accent, which might have been French. "I'm Laurent and these are Victoria and James." He indicated his two companions.

Carlisle introduced each one of us by name, not singling any one out in particular. I felt Bella look up in surprise when he included her in our family, but luckily she kept quiet.

I never once relaxed my hold on her and my family wasn't loosening up either. It was too early in the encounter to do so and besides, Alice had seen something. I had the very strong feeling it had not been good.

"We were wondering if you'd have room for a few more players," Laurent now asked politely.

"We're sorry, but we were just about done for today. Maybe some other time," Carlisle matched Laurent's tone. "You're planning on staying in the area?" he probed carefully.

"We thought about heading up further north, actually. We were just curious when we heard you for we haven't met others of our kind in a long time."

On the surface, Laurent seemed to be friendly enough. It was really quite possible all they wanted was to socialize a little, without any strings attached, but my family couldn't afford to take any risks, not with Bella and me there.

"We have a permanent dwelling, not too far from here," Carlisle now informed them, "and we would appreciate it if you wouldn't hunt in the immediate area. We don't want to draw any attention to ourselves."

"Of course," Laurent nodded.

Vampires, by nature, were very territorial, even though it wasn't very common for them to have a permanent home for any longer period. My family was an exception, especially as they interacted regularly with humans who normally would have been their food source and nothing else. But once a vampire coven had claimed a certain area as their hunting ground, no other vampire would dare to encroach on it, unless he was out for a fight.

The woman and the other man had both studied us closely and I took great pain not to allow them to see Bella's eyes or mine. More than anything, they would give us away easiest as human. There was no way I could stop our heartbeats or hide our smell, but had to hope they wouldn't notice.

I should have known it was a futile hope. One moment it looked like they would get Carlisle's hint and go back to wherever they had came from, the next the one named James turned and inhaled deeply, his nostrils flaring.

He fell into a crouch, his eyes fixed on Bella and myself, his movements copied by the woman. My family responded in kind, their ranks closing, so that all I could now see were their backs. I still could hear, though.

"What is this?" a new voice asked, and I deduced it had to be James. "Did you bring snacks?" There was something like eagerness in his voice and I didn't like his tone at all.

"They're with us," Carlisle stated with a firm voice, leaving no doubt that it wouldn't be a good idea to do anything rash.

"But they're human," Laurent responded. He sounded more surprised than anything else.

"They are with us," Carlisle repeated once more with a little bit more force, "and you will not touch them."

I saw Emmett move to one side in response to something one of the other vampires did, and for a second I caught a glimpse of Laurent, who stood upright, his hands held out in a soothing gesture.

"We already said we won't hunt on your grounds. We don't want any trouble."

"Doesn't look like that to me," Emmett now spoke up, He was growling from the depth of his chest. His back was tense and it wouldn't take much to set him off.

Suddenly I feared for my family. I knew they could take care of themselves in a fight and they had the advantage of greater numbers on their side, but still, if it came to a fight they might get injured or maybe even worse. Only a vampire could kill another vampire. This was one rule I had been told a long time ago.

Bella stifled a sob against my chest and I turned my attention to her. I needed to protect her and if it was the last thing I ever did. It was my fault she was in this situation; if not for me she would be safe at home and wouldn't know anything about this craziness that was my life. I pulled her closer against my chest, one hand stroking her hair, the other around her shoulder.

"We're going to leave now," I heard Laurent say. "James? Victoria?"

"All right," James said, sounding angry, but I heard the rustle of feet as he straightened up and took a couple of steps backwards.

My family relaxed minusculely, but wouldn't slack their watchfulness.

"We're leaving," Laurent repeated once again. And then they were gone.

"Jasper, Rosalie, follow them. I want to know where they are heading. Esme, Emmett, you get Edward and Bella back to the house. We can protect them better there if they should decide to come back. Alice, what have you seen?" Carlisle took command of the situation, distributing the tasks with efficiency.

Even though I also wanted to know what it had been that had set Alice off earlier, I now had more pressing business to attend to. Bella was shaking like a leaf, her sobs now louder and out of control. On one side it pained me to see her like this, on the other hand I was almost glad she finally showed some reasonable response to a dangerous situation. She had taken the news that my family was made up of vampires far too calmly, and even if she had nothing to fear from them, not anymore at least, it was a good sign that she had at least some kind of self-preservation instinct intact.

I took her head into my hands, trying to wipe away her tears with my thumbs.

"It's all right, Bella, they're gone. You're safe. They can't do anything to you now."

She looked up at me and I was surprised that her brown eyes held anger beside her fear.

"You idiot," she said, fury rising in her voice. Her small hands balled into fists and she used them to hit me in the chest. "I wasn't afraid for me. I was afraid for you!"

"What?" I asked, sure I had heard incorrectly. Why should Bella be afraid for me? And why the hell did she say she hadn't been afraid for herself?

"What if they'd done something to you?" Now she was in full rage mode. She struggle to get away from me and I let her go. She placed her fists against her hips and glared at me.

"But," I sputtered, still trying to comprehend what was going on in her head. "It's my fault you're here, Bella. If something would have happened to anybody, it would have been you. And I would never have forgiven myself."

She tossed her hands into the air, in the universal gesture of giving up on a hopeless situation and then started to stalk towards the nearby tree line.

I looked at her retreating back, confused and beginning to feel a little bit angry myself. What was wrong with her? This wasn't normal behavior, of that I was sure, but I just didn't get what made her act like that.

"Bella," I called after her. "Where are you going?"

"Back to the car," she tossed over her shoulder.

For one moment I thought about letting her walk on, but then decided it was simply too dangerous.

"Bella, the car is in that direction." I pointed west. Bella was walking north.

She stopped and her shoulders slumped as all fight seemed to leave her. I longed to take her into my arms, to hold her and soothe her, but there were more important things to do now. I ran after her. Emmett and Esme had luckily given us this moment, but now they met us at the border between the field and the forest.

"We need to hurry," Emmett said, looking around very much on guard. He obviously didn't like the situation, but who was I to blame him for that? I didn't like it either.

I nodded, knowing what had to come next. "Esme, are you taking Bella?" I asked the woman who almost was as much a mother to me as Rosalie. She nodded.

When I had been little, Emmett or Rosalie had sometimes taken me on their backs and had raced with me through the forests of whatever place we had been staying at that time. Even with my added weight they were able to achieve incredible speeds and I always had loved it, squealing in joy as the wind rushed through my hair and the trees passed me by. I never had been afraid for I knew they would never allow any harm to come to me. I now was older and of course I refrained now from such childish activities. To get to our car as quickly as possible, though, I knew I was now in for another piggyback ride. I didn't mind, but I wondered how Bella would react.

I saw Esme talking to Bella, possibly explaining to her what they were planning to do. Bella looked at her in shock, clearly dubious at how anybody as slender as Esme would be able to carry her through the forest and still be any faster than when she would be walking on her own two feet. It clearly would take some more time for her to really understand how strong a vampire was.

"You're sure?" she asked, now loud enough for me to hear.

Instead of an answer, Esme swung Bella onto her back with ease. "Hold tight and don't worry. You won't strangle me."

I now leapt onto Emmett's back, wrapping my arms around his neck and my legs around his middle. He got a good grip on my legs and then asked me if I was ready in a low tone.

I nodded against his back.

"Bella, you better close your eyes," I advised her before my world turned into a streaking blur of brown and green. The run was as exhilarating as I remembered from my childhood days, but my concentration was more focused on the two bodies I barely was able to make out just behind us.

It had taken us twenty minutes to hike through the forest from the car to the field we played in. On the way back it could have been no more than a minute before I made out the Jeep waiting for us at the end of the road.

As I jumped clear of Emmett and turned to help take Bella from Esme's back, I could see she hadn't taken my advice. Her eyes were impossibly wide and she was more than just a little green around her nose now. Normally I would have made her sit down with her head between her knees to calm her troubled stomach, but we didn't have the time for that. Out here in the open we were just too vulnerable. Instead I opened the passenger door of the Jeep and helped her up inside. I quickly followed, while Esme took the driver's seat and Emmett jumped onto the truck bed.

I barely had Bella's safety harness on when Esme turned the Jeep around and we were bouncing down the narrow access road at breakneck speed. I struggled with my own harness and eventually managed to click it into place. Esme, of course, hadn't bothered and she was sitting on her seat as if somebody had welded her to it.

"Are you all right?" I called over the roar of the Jeep's engine to Bella.

It was still light enough outside to see Bella's pale face. Her hands were clamped tightly to the seat and I she looked like it took everything she had not to get sick right then and there. I don't know if she had heard me, for I didn't get any response from her, so I reached out and took her hand into mine. At my touch, she looked up and I gave her an encouraging smile.

"You don't need to worry," I called. All I got in response was a weak smile that disappeared after only a second.

Once we reached the highway, driving got much smoother, though Esme picked up speed until we were going way beyond the posted limit. She gave us both a quick smile, but then turned her concentration back to the road. Through the back window, I saw Emmett standing on the flatbed, his hands on the rollover bar, looking through the forest to either side of the road. Once I thought I saw a shadow move through the woods, but when I saw that Emmett didn't change his stance, I concluded that it had to be either Carlisle or Alice, or, maybe, that I just had imagined it.

By the time we arrived at the house, it was lit up like a Christmas tree. Every single light in the house had been switched on and in the now falling darkness it stood out bright, warm and welcoming.

I fumbled to open the harness, then reached over to Bella to help her to get out of hers. She was pale, almost as pale as my family. When Emmett jumped down from the back of the Jeep she started, looking around with saucer-like eyes.

"What's going on?" she asked me in a whisper, keeping close to my side while we walked inside the house.

"War council. We need to find out what those other vamps are planning and how we will react to it," I explained in a hushed voice as I pulled her into the dinning room. Carlisle, Esme and Alice had already gathered around the table, while Emmett had disappeared to sweep the area around the house. I found a seat for Bella, then sat down next to her. Rosalie and Jasper were both still absent and I didn't know if this was a good or a bad sign.

"What do they want from us?" Bella now asked.

I wished I could tell her that I didn't know and that she didn't need to worry, but I knew that this would be a lie. I had a very good idea what they wanted. I just didn't know how to tell Bella. How does one tell the woman he loved that she was nothing better than a delicious meal for James? I had told her before about her oh-so-irresistible smell, but I believed she didn't fully understand the consequences of it yet.

I turned to take her hand. "I would think they want you," I stated, looking into her eyes. "But they won't get you. We won't allow it."

My eyes gazed over to my family – well at least those who were currently with me – to see their confirmation. Carlisle and Esme looked certain, but in Alice's eyes I saw fear and doubt, and this didn't do anything to make me feel any better.

"But why me? Couldn't they go for anybody else?" Bella asked, her face still pale, her free hand covering her mouth. "Not that I want them to kill anybody else, but what makes me so special?"

"I did mention how you smell to vampires?" I reminded her of what I had told her in Port Angeles in what now seemed such a long time ago. Had it really been less than a week?

"Oh!" she said. She now also looked at my family, looking for confirmation. "Is that true? Do I really smell so good to you?" she asked in a small voice.

Carlisle nodded. "You have a very appealing scent to us, much more so than most other humans. When we're not too thirsty, we normally have no problems being around most people. You on the other hand …" he didn't finish the sentence for which I was grateful. Bella didn't need to know all the details.

"It's not just that," a new voice said, a voice with a very distinct French accent.

I was up from my chair and standing protectively in front of Bella before I was even aware I was moving. I didn't need to have bothered, though, as the others had done the same, and much faster than me. Emmett, who must have come in together with the dark-skinned vampire, looked at him with wary eyes as he joined the rest of the family.

"He was waiting outside, asked me to see you," he explained, clearly not happy.

Carlisle straightened up after the first second and addressed the visitor with the olive-toned skin. "What is your purpose here? I take if you are not interested in a fight."

Laurent held up his hands in a placating gesture. "I'm here because I'm curious," he said, "and also because I want to give you a warning."


	22. Chapter 22

"What warning?" my father all but growled.

"About James. He's a tracker, a hunter. He lives for the hunt, the excitement and the challenge. If he sees something he wants, he will not give up before he gets it. And now he wants your humans. That you protect them will make it only a so much more interesting game for him."

"He can try," Emmett tossed out his own challenge. "He will not succeed."

Laurent shook his head. "He will not give up, of that I'm sure. He is patient and will wait as long as he has to. You won't be able to protect them forever."

"Then we will go after him," my father now said fiercely. "We will turn the hunt and he will be the hunted."

"I'm sure he counts on it," Laurent said. "Victoria will help him and she's also a force to be reckoned with. They are a mated pair and she will do whatever he wants."

"What do you suggest?" Carlisle intervened.

Laurent shrugged. "I only wanted to warn you, to give you an idea who and what you are up against. You are a large group and you seem to be strong. You will find a way."

"Why the warning?" Bella now spoke up in a clear voice. "What is it to you?" I looked at her in shock that she had found the courage to speak in this situation.

Laurent inclined his head a little, possibly also intrigued. "I have become … disenchanted with James and Victory, if I may say so. I don't think their way is mine any longer. When I saw you, with your golden eyes and your ability to form such a strong bond with humans, I was fascinated. In my three hundred years I've never met people like you."

I sensed Carlisle relaxing, but neither I nor Emmett showed any signs that we let off.

"You will understand that currently is not a good time for us to talk, but I might give you direction to others like us," Carlisle now proposed.

Laurent sketched a quick bow to indicate that he would accept any help Carlisle was willing to give him at the moment.

"There is a coven up in Alaska, in Denali, that is following the same path we do. You could go see them. They will welcome you."

I had heard my family speak of the Denali clan before, but never had actually met them, even though we had lived in Alaska for several years. I knew the group consisted of at least three female vampires who all had given up living off human blood even before they had met Carlisle. I had always been curious on why we never met up, but strangely enough my family had been fairly close-lipped about the other coven and after some time I had given up asking.

"Beware of James," Laurent warned us once again and then he was gone as if he had never existed.

It took a long moment before Emmett relaxed. I sat back down again after picking up the chair I had toppled over when I had jumped to stand in front of Bella. I had no choice really, as I doubted my legs would support me much longer.

"Is he really gone," I asked Alice, who now had sat down on the other side of the table.

She closed her eyes, looking into that mysterious place inside of her where she had her visions. When she opened her eyes, she nodded shortly. "He will find the Denali clan and will live for some time with them. He will cause us no trouble to us."

I exhaled slowly, steeling myself for the next question. "What about James and Victoria? I know you have seen something back in the field."

She pressed her lips into a thin line, looking over at Emmett and the others, but not at me.

"Alice," I called her once again. "Please. I need to know." I instinctively reached for Bella's hand under the table, instantly feeling a little better for holding her. Right now I felt so damn useless, knowing that on my own I had no chance in hell to defend her from James.

She sighed then finally looked up into my eyes. "I see you dead, Edward. I'm so sorry."

I had already expected something like this, so I didn't feel particularly surprised. I know it didn't make sense, but in a way I was almost glad. At least I knew the stakes now. And Alice had said that she had seen _me _dead, not Bella. As long as she lived, I could and would accept everything that happened to me. Don't get me wrong, I didn't have any particular death wish - far from it - but given the alternative, I knew what I preferred.

I felt myself letting go of the tension that had me wound as tight as a watch.

I wasn't exactly surprised that the others didn't share my opinion.

"What?" Bella would have jumped up from her chair if not for my hand holding her down. Emmett wasn't so encumbered, though, and he was standing again, glaring at his sister angrily.

"I can't help it, Emmett. I'm sorry, but that's what I see. Do you think I like it? I love Edward, too. You know that."

"Then look again," he demanded. "There must be another future for Edward."

Now Alice got angry herself, though she at least remained seated. "Don't you think I haven't tried? But currently this is the most likely outcome. James is going to kill him." If she could have produced tears, I was sure she would have cried in anger.

Carlisle now intervened, holding up his hands in a calming manner. "Emmett, Alice, you're both familiar with Alice's visions. Now we know for sure what James is after and with that we will find a way to prevent it. Nothing will happen to Edward."

Emmett sat back down, though not without casting one last angry glance at Alice.

Rosalie and Jasper came into the dinning room then, a streak and a blur and they were there. Jasper immediately went to Alice's side while Rosalie found her way to my side.

With that eerie way of communication vampires possessed, Esme quickly brought them up to date, her lips vibrating so fast, they almost blurred.

Rosalie looked at me through narrowed eyes. I was sure she noticed how calm I was, but I didn't know what she was making of it.

"We have lost them," Jasper said obviously annoyed at himself. He stood with a hand on Alice's left shoulder. Alice reached up and caressed his hand, pulling it to her lips for a quick kiss.

"A short while after they left us in the field, they split up," Rosalie now explained. "Their speaker went into this direction, but we thought the others to be more dangerous, so we followed them, but then they managed to shake us. They went east, but I think eventually they are going to double back and come here again." She also sounded angry at herself.

Carlisle nodded. "This is likely their plan. The question now is: what are we going to do?"

"We stand and fight." Emmett.

"We run and hide." Jasper.

The two brothers stared at each other across the table.

"I need to get back to Charlie … my dad," now Bella said, her eyes on me.

"No!" I exclaimed. There was no way I would let Bella out of my sight right now. Chief Swan couldn't protect her like my family could. He might be a cop and have a gun, but that wouldn't do anything against a vampire. All that would happen would be that he died himself in the hopeless defense of his daughter. That was if he even noticed what was going on in the first place. Vampires were very fast.

She turned her hands so that instead of me holding her hands, she was now holding mine. "You told my dad I'd be back by nine and it's already getting late. If I don't show up, he might think something happened."

She had a point there. I hadn't thought about Chief Swan's reaction. He, of course, had no idea about my family's secrets and about the dangers his daughter was in now because of me. No matter what plan we decided on, we had to think about what we tell him. If we indeed, like Jasper suggested, run, we would take Bella with us, and if we did so without telling Chief Swan anything, he might think the worst possible thing. I wouldn't put it past him to call in the FBI and who knows who, thinking of kidnapping and murder. My family was very good at hiding and I was fairly sure we would be able to disappear without a trace, but it would make the whole situation more complicated than it already was.

The question of course was what to tell him?

The truth was for obvious reasons out of the question – even if we somehow managed to convince him that we weren't a bunch of lunatics - and other than that …

Jasper looked thoughtfully at the two of us and I was sure he was thinking about some of the same things I did.

"We can't stay here," he said, his gaze on Bella. "It won't take long for James to learn about your father and I won't put it past him to use him - or anyone else of your friends for that matter - as leverage in order to get to you. They won't be more than pawns to him."

I hadn't thought about that and by Bella's reaction neither had she. Even though I didn't socialize here in Forks much outside of my family, I still knew several people in town I rather liked and wouldn't want to see hurt. Bella had managed to make quick friends at school and those friends also would be at risk.

I knew that James would have a hard time to get through my family at Bella or me. But give her a strong enough incentive to come to him – and holding Bella's father as a hostage would most certainly achieve that – Bella would try to find a way around them and I had a feeling that, somehow, she would manage it. And if she didn't somehow get away from us, James would have no problem killing Charlie Swan just for the fun of it. No problem at all.

I felt Bella's hands start to shake and a tear formed in the corner of her eyes.

"What do I tell him?" she whispered, half to herself.

"You need to find a reason why you have to leave Forks for a while. Once we've taken care of James and Victoria, we will come back."

"He won't let me go."

I thought for a moment. "How about you tell him you want to go back to your mother in Florida? Or back to Phoenix," I suggested.

She thought for a moment, but then inclined her head a little. "He won't like it," she said slowly. "And he will check with my mom. I can't go to her. It will put her at risk the same way Charlie is now in danger. But what if I don't show up there?"

"We will have taken care of the problem by then," Emmett now said with absolute conviction.

I believed him. It wasn't in my father's nature to run from anything. I wasn't so fond of it either, to be honest. If we really had to leave here – and right now it looked like it was the only valid option – then we would go to a place where we could draw out James and Victoria and then my family would take care of them. Once and for all.

Carlisle was probable the only one who actually would feel any remorse over it. But even he would fight if it was the only way to protect Bella and me; that much I knew. I looked across the table at him and saw a grim smile on his face. No, he didn't like it – but yes, he was determined to see this through.

"How?" I now asked into the round. "And where are we going?" I hoped my voice didn't betray the tension I was under.

"It doesn't really matter where we go," Jasper replied. "I would like to lay a wrong trail, away from you, but I have my doubts it will work. Maybe if it were only one of you we could take your clothes and use your scent to lead them away, but, as I said, I don't think they will fall for it. I also don't want to split you two up – it would mean that we would have to split up our forces too and I would rather avoid that."

As I was all for staying close to Bella, I only nodded.

But Jasper wasn't done. He once had been a major in the Civil War and now I was glad for his military experience.

"We'll have Bella and Edward with maybe two of us in the lead and the rest follows at a greater distance, looking out for James and Victoria. As soon as they think they're close enough, we pounce and then we take care of them once and for all." There was a feral grin on Jasper's face like I had never seen before and I felt the sudden urge to crawl into a deep hole to hide. It was obvious what he meant with 'taking care of them once and for all' and even though I fully agreed with that sentiment, it also made me a little queasy.

"I'm not allowing Edward to be used as bait," Rosalie now exclaimed. She looked at Jasper angrily, lips pressed into a tight line.

"We can't keep Edward and Bella as prisoners here or in any other place, Rosalie. We need to find a way to end this situation and to end it quickly. Jasper is right, it's the best way." Emmett placed his arm around his wife, squeezing her shoulder gently. "You and I will stay with them and they will be safe as long we're with them."

"What about my dad?" Bella now asked. "What if they still try to get to him?"

Jasper thought for a moment, then nodded slowly. "One of us will stay behind - at least until we are very sure James and Victoria have taken the bait."

Carlisle had listened how Jasper had worked out the plan and now stood up from his seat at the end of the table. Even though he allowed every one of them to have his or her say in any matter that pertained to the family, it was always him who had the last word and him whom the others followed.

"I can't say that I like this situation," he began. "But Jasper's plan looks to be the best option we have. Emmett and Jasper, you go with Edward and Bella to her home, then come straight back. The others - go pack. Take only what we need. I do hope we will be able to come back here, but don't count on it. You know what to do."

With a plan worked out, we all sprung into action. My family had perfected the art of pulling up stakes and move at a moment's notice. It hadn't been necessary for the last two decades, for none of them had slipped and 'accidently' killed a human because they had lost control, but it had happened before that, and they were always ready for it. There was a rather large sum of cash hidden away in the house, enough to go by for several months if we had to. Carlisle would make sure that his sudden disappearance from the hospital would be believable, with a made-up family emergency giving enough reason to all of us suddenly having to move. Hopefully, this time it wouldn't be for very long and we would be able to return to Forks soon.

Emmett and Jasper accompanied us out to the Jeep. Emmett jumped once again onto the truck bed. Jasper let me have the driver's seat and while I buckled up, he helped Bella in the middle seat with the straps, then sat down next to her. I approved of that arrangement, as this granted her the best protection.

"Are you okay?" I asked her as I started the car. I longed to touch her, but settled instead to grip the steering wheel with both hands.

As the Jeep rumbled to life, she looked me into the eyes. I could see that she was scared, but there was also a firm determination to not allow the fear to rule her. She nodded shortly. "I'm okay." She gave me a tight smile.

For the whole drive to Bella's home I was skittish, constantly looking out of the windows, expecting to see James or Victoria behind a tree, a house. I knew it was futile, that I had no chance whatsoever to make them out, but that didn't stop me from trying. If anybody would see anything it would be Emmett or Jasper, and both of them seemed to be calm.

Once we reached the house, Jasper slipped out of the Jeep. He would stay close by, keeping an eye on the house and its occupants. He also would monitor Chief Swan's emotions, steering them, if needed, into a direction we wanted. Normally he wouldn't do something like this - he didn't particularly like to use his ability to manipulate people. But in the current situation we couldn't risk Chief Swan to be difficult. It would be hard enough as it was.

Meanwhile, Emmett had disappeared to check the surrounding area for the nomads. I didn't know if I hoped he'd detect them or not. If Emmett found them, then at least we knew where they were. On the other hand, if they attacked him … Emmett was strong, but two against one weren't good odds, even for him. But if it came to a fight Jasper would join him and that would equal the odd considerably. Emmett might be the strongest, but Jasper was the most experienced fighter.

Bella had finally figured out how to operate the off-road harness and was ready to leave the car by the time I got mine off.

"I have an idea how I can convince Charlie to let me go. But I will have to convince him that we two broke up, so you know whatever I'll say the next couple of minutes will not be true" She reached over to touch my cheek and I wished I could just take her and kiss her. Instead I had to settle on covering her hand with mine, even if it was only for a moment.

"I know," I whispered and nodded. "I love you."

Despite the situation, she found a small smile for me. "I love you, too, Edward. No matter what will happen, I do love you and always want to be with you."

I thought my heart was about to break that very moment. How could Bella, after all that had happened to her because of me still want to be with me? I had brought her nothing but danger, it was because of me she would be on the run until James and Victoria were taken care of, and still, still she said she loved me. What had I done to deserve a woman like her?

All the house lights on the ground floor were on – Charlie obviously was waiting up for Bella. Now that we were sure of our audience the show could begin.

We both got out. The moment Bella's feet touched the ground, her whole posture changed. She seemed to grow a couple of inches, her back stiff and straight, her hands balled into fists. She took a long shuddering breath and began to stalk towards the front door. I followed a short distance behind her my shoulders slumped forward as I tried to project dejection and anger in equal measures.

"Bella, just listen to me," I called in a pleading voice.

"You stay away from me, Edward Cullen," Bella yelled back at me. "I don't want to see you ever again."

"Please, I'm sorry. Really, just tell me what I have done," I pleaded as she ran up the steps of the porch.

She ripped the door open, then was inside. Before I could say another word, she slammed the door into my face. I could hear Charlie's concerned voice through the door, but couldn't make out the words. Heavy feet ran up the wooden stairs inside.

I stepped back from the porch to see the lights in Bella's room go on. For a second I wondered if I should attempt to climb up the trellis on the side of the house to help her pack, then realized that this was rather impractical. Besides, if Charlie should find me in her room our whole ruse would be for nothing.

So, with a heavy heart, I returned to the Jeep and climbed inside. I wished I'd had my family's hearing to be able to listen in on Bella's words, to know what she was saying to her father to convince him to let her leave. She hadn't told me exactly what her plan was, but I was sure she knew how to handle her father.

I backed the Jeep out of the driveway then drove for a block, until I couldn't see her house any more. As soon as Bella was out of the house, she would come here with her truck and we would drive together to our home where the others would already wait for us. I had not even put the Jeep into park when the passenger door opened and Emmett slipped inside. He took one look at me and sighed.

"She's doing fine, Edward. Her father will let her go."

"And you know that how? Do you now have Alice's abilities?" I all but yelled at him. It wasn't that I was in any way angry at my father, but I just had to let out some steam and he was the nearest target.

Emmett just looked at me until I lowered my gaze. "Sorry," was all I said. I hadn't meant to snap at him.

"It's all right, son," Emmett spoke with a gentle voice, the same one he had used when I had been younger and I had been scared for one reason or another. Back then it had always managed to calm me down and now, after all those years, it still had the same effect on me. I longed to crawl into his arms, like I had done as a kid, but obviously I couldn't do that anymore. Still, it didn't stop me from wishing.

"I'm scared," I admitted in a whisper. "If anything should happen to Bella, I will never be able to forgive myself."

"Nothing will happen to her or to you for that matter," Emmett said, reaching out to place a cold hand on my arm. "We will protect you both. I promise."

I didn't know how Emmett was able to promise that, especially in light of what Alice had seen, but somehow it still made me feel a little better.

I fell silent, watching my father as he listened in on Bella's fight with her father. I really wanted to know what she was telling him, but didn't know how to ask Emmett. I knew whatever it was, it would be hurting her. She loved her father and the only way for him to let her go would be to tell him lies. On one hand I hoped she would be convincing, for her father had to believe her. But on the other hand I wished she didn't need to do it, because I knew what it would cost her.

Emmett's head shot up. "She's coming," he only said.

I waited for the faded red truck to come around the corner. The truck stopped next to the Jeep and through the windows I could see Bella was crying. I practically already had wrenched my door open when Emmett pulled me back.

"Jasper is going to drive her. She's fine."

Just then Jasper opened her door and somehow maneuvered her onto the passenger side of the truck, taking the wheel himself. For one moment I saw Bella's wide eyes then the darkness swallowed her, as Jasper sped up, with us following them.

At the house I got out of the Jeep as quickly as possible, running to Bella's door. If I'd have vampire strength, I would have pulled the door right off its hinges. Bella virtually fell into my arms and I held her shaking form while around us the family got ready. Distantly, I noticed that it had been decided that Esme would stay behind, keeping an eye on Bella's father until it was certain that James and Victoria were both following us. Only then would she follow us as well. Rosalie and Emmett ushered us into the back seat of Carlisle's black Mercedes, but the others went into the BMW and my Volvo.

Doors slammed closed, then the powerful engine of the Mercedes purred to life and we were all heading south.

tbc

* * *

AN: Dear readers,

I do have to make a confession. This is it. There is, at least for now, nothing more.

I started writting this story last March (that's March 2009). I was going strong, when suddenly *bamm* I ran into a wall. I tried to go on. I do have a plan where this is going. But I ... just ... couldn't ... get it ... down on paper (or into the computer as it was). I had the story sitting on my hard drive for a long time, as my policy so far always has been not to post in incomplete story. I've kept going back to it, tried a couple of new starts but without any success.

But then I realized that this was by far the longest story I've ever written. I do *like* the story. I want to show it to the world. So I sent it to my friend for beta (who went above and beyond the call of duty - this is so not her fandom it's not even funny any more) and after she sent it back to me, I began posting. Maybe I was hoping by getting feedback, I would finally find the drive to get through that blasted wall in my head. And the feedback and the reviews are a rush, I tell you.

Still I haven't managed to write anything more. I do have a couple of ideas though and once I have a bit more time, I will try to finish this. I haven't given up on the story. But I don't know if this is going to be next week, or next month, or next whatever. When I come back, it will be after I finish the story, so I won't let you hang like this again.

Thanks for everybody who reviewed so far and everybody who's going to do so.

I'm sorry letting you all hang like this. Just ... please be patient.


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